Preamble

The House met at Eleven o'clock

PRAYERS

[Mr. SPEAKER in the Chair]

PRIVATE BUSINESS

GREATER LONDON LOCAL RADIO AUTHORITY BILL (By Order)

WALSALL CORPORATION BILL (By Order)

WEST BROMWICH CORPORATION BILL (By Order)

WOLVERHAMPTON CORPORATION BILL (By Order)

Second Reading deferred till Tuesday, 15th April.

Oral Answers to Questions — TELEPHONE SERVICE

North Birmingham

Mr. Christopher Price: asked the Postmaster-General when a new telephone exchange will be installed in North Birmingham; where it will be situated; and what arrangements he is making to shorten the waiting list in the area in the meantime.

The Postmaster-General (Mr. John Stonehouse): At the end of 1970, in Queslett Road. We are putting more lines in at existing exchanges. All those now waiting should have service by the autumn of this year.

Mr. Price: Does my right hon. Friend agree that the delay has been far too long? Will he tell us what it has cost? If the components manufacturers are not delivering equipment in time will he name them, in an effort to make them get a move on?

Mr. Stonehouse: There has been a great expansion in demand, but, as I said,

we hope to meet the demand by the end of this year.

Shared Lines

Mr. Christopher Price: asked the Postmaster-General which categories of telephone subscribers are exempt from being compulsorily transferred from a single to a shared line; and if he will include ministers of religion in this list.

Mr. Stonehouse: I am circulating a full list in the OFFICIAL REPORT; Ministers of religion are included.

Mr. Price: Is my right hon. Friend aware that it will be a very good idea to publicise this list among public and local Post Office officials alike? Is he further aware that in my constituency a minister of religion was asked to share a line? Does he think that persuading people who have single lines to share them is, in the long term, a sensible policy for the Post Office to adopt?

Mr. Stonehouse: I am satisfied that, given the shortage of exchange lines, it is wise to have shared lines so that as many potential subscribers as possible can be linked up, but there is no question of a minister of religion being told that he must share the service.

Mr. Dobson: Will my right hon. Friend consider in his review the very important category of councillors? I understand that these people are eligible for shared service lines, but as they deal with confidential and private information they should not be included in that list.

Mr. Stonehouse: This aspect has been considered in the past, but it was felt that to extend the exclusion as far as that would be unwise. I will, of course, consider this suggestion again.

Following is list:

All residential subscribers connected before 1st January, 1948;

All business customers,

Members of both Houses of Parliament,

Judges of the High Court and above,

Senior officers of the Diplomatic and Consular Services, and Ministers of Religion.

Oral Answers to Questions — POST OFFICE

Finance (Loss-Making Activities)

Mr. Kenneth Baker: asked the Postmaster-General what is the financial policy regarding the loss-making activities of the Post Office; and if he will make a statement.

Mr. Stonehouse: I am considering the position.

Mr. Baker: The Postmaster-General may accept that many of my hon. Friends welcome his recent frankness in persuading his colleagues to face up to some home truths, but why cannot that same frankness extend to the loss-making Post Office services—telegrams, money orders, and postal orders and the Giro—which are losing £10 million a year? What does he propose to do about that?

Mr. Stonehouse: We have been very frank. We have revealed information about those parts of our service which are a social service to the community, and this has not been done in the same detail before. We have done that in order that the facts can be identified so as to help us to consider what is the best way of dealing with the problem.

Mr. Bryan: Does the Postmaster-General realise that members of the pub-lice are somewhat puzzled about his statements? At one time he said that there would be no rises in the tariff during this year, and now we are told that he is reconsidering the parcels service, and so on. Perhaps he will clarify the position for us.

Mr. Stonehouse: The Parliamentary Question which I answered a few weeks ago referred to the two-tier service. I gave an assurance that in this financial year there would be no increase there, but I gave no such assurance about those parts of the service which make a loss.

Cable and Wireless Limited

Mr. Tilney: asked the Postmaster-General to what extent there has been a loss of traffic from Cable and Wireless to private enterprise cable companies.

Mr. Stonehouse: During the industrial dispute there was some loss of traffic but not since.

Mr. Tilney: As many firms went to competing companies as a result of the strike, and found these to be more efficient, will the right hon. Gentleman ensure that the management of Cable and Wireless Limited keeps up its efficiency so that it can compete with these companies?

Mr. Stonehouse: It is my information that a good deal of the business lost during the strike has since come back and that the service provided is extremely efficient.

Unstamped Letters (Delivery)

Mr. Tilney: asked the Postmaster-General how long on average it takes to deliver an unstamped letter.

Mr. Stonehouse: Within two working days of posting.

Mr. Tilney: Is the Postmaster-General aware that this is often faster than letters which are properly stamped? Does he realise that many firms in the provinces are reduced to sending couriers twice a week with the firms' own correspondence to London? Is this not very uneconomic, especially as they cannot take anyone else's letters? Would he consider allowing private enterprise to compete?

Mr. Stonehouse: These points are wholly exaggerated. The service which we provide is extremely good, and business firms have come to rely on it. I do not accept that the service has deteriorated in the way that the hon. Gentleman implies.

Mr. Bryan: while the figures which the right hon. Gentleman normally quotes for the service are obviously quite satisfactory in a general way, does he not conclude from his own postbag that there are black areas in which the record is far less satisfactory? Would it not be worthwhile for the Post Office to conduct surveys in those areas so that action can be taken?

Mr. Stonehouse: There are parts of the country which fall below the general achievement, and we are constantly examining the situation to see how these areas can be improved. My postbag has declined considerably in the last few months and it looks as though a lot of steam has gone out of the artificial campaign stimulated by hon. Members on the other side of the House.

Special Stamp (Botany Bay)

Mr. Body: asked the Postmaster-General if he will issue a special postage stamp in 1970 to mark the bicentenary of Captain Cook's discovery of Botany Bay, emphasising the part played by the Lincolnshire explorer, Sir Joseph Banks.

Mr. Stonehouse: This anniversary is already on our list of suggestions for 1970, and I am considering it.

Mr. Body: Is the Postmaster-General aware that while Lincolnshire appreciates recognition of its past, it would also appreciate recognition of present difficulties?

Mr. Stonehouse: Yes, it is a good idea and we will bear it in mind.

Mr. Russell Kerr: May I press the Postmaster-General on this point? I am sure that if he is able to put the hon. Member's suggestion into effect he will find that it is a gesture much appreciated not only in this House but also in Australia?

Mr. Stonehouse: I am grateful for the comment. My hon. Friend, who is an Australian, will be delighted to see the stamps which we have just brought out celebrating the first England-Australia flight.

Staff

Mr. Kenneth Baker: asked the Postmaster-General why in 1968–69, in view of the fact that the profits of the Post Office are officially estimated to fall by £7 million the staff numbers have been allowed to increase by an estimated 8,000.

Mr. Stonehouse: Staff increases were caused by the new Giro service, the taking over of the staff canteens, new housing estates needing more delivery postmen, and increased business.
Improvement in productivity prevented much larger increases.

Mr. Baker: Is it not a disgraceful example of Ministerial inertia that while profits are declining, clerical staff—and that is what this is—has increased by 8,000? Does this not indicate a lack of determination and energy to cut costs, evident throughout the whole Government, and particularly evident in the Post Office?

Mr. Stonehouse: I do not accept that at all. We have had an increase of productivity of quite sizeable proportions. In one section of our business we have increased turnover by 11 per cent. with an increase of staff of only 1½ per cent.

Mr. Shinwell: Has my right hon. Friend seen the statement by the General Secretary of the Postal Workers' Union to the effect that the administration suffers because it is excessively top-heavy? Is he aware that it is said that there are far too many people at the top while at the bottom a large number of persons have become redundant?

Mr. Stonehouse: There have been no redundancies in that sense. We have had productivity agreements with the full co-operation of the staff sides. There is no reason for them to complain, because their own members have enjoyed increased income as a result. I do not accept the main case which has been made against us by Mr. Jackson. We have on the postal side of our business 200,000 staff. The supervisory staff number about 3,000, which is about 1½ per cent.—a very low proportion indeed, comparing very well with any other similar business.

Mr. Bryan: Has there not been an increase in Treasury grade staff to the extent of 6,500 in this period?

Mr. Stonehouse: There has been an increase in staff to start the Giro and there has been an increase in accountancy staff to deal with the administration of the staff canteens, which are now transferred to our responsibility.

Mr. Dobson: Is my right hon. Friend forgetting that there has also been an increase in regional staff caused by the splitting of the post and telegraphs into two sections, and as this was supported by hon. Members opposite, who pressed very hard for it, would it not be fair to lay some of the blame at least at their door, because they thought of the idea first?

Mr. Stonehouse: That is the case. The administration of a vast investment programme of £2,000 million in five years and the expansion of our commmunications system by 50 per cent. in these five years has called for an increase in some staff.

Ships (Letter Telegram Service)

Mr. Dobson: asked the Posmaster-General whether, in view of the staff shortages at Burnham Radio, he will give an undertaking not to withdraw the ship letter telegram service from ships.

Mr. Stonehouse: At present it is not my intention to suspend the service.

Mr. Dobson: While I am grateful for that intimation, may I ask my right hon. Friend to go further? He must be aware that there is a drop of commitments in this station due to staff shortages. How long will he allow this to go on before he has to think seriously about with-drawing the services for ships at sea, which are very important indeed?

Mr. Stonehouse: I agree about the importance of this situation and I will keep it under close review.

Radio Operators

Mr. Dobson: asked the Postmaster-General when he proposes to start new negotiations over the regrading of Post Office radio operators; what is the present staff shortage; and what his estimate is of the staff shortages in three and six months' time, respectively.

Mr. Stonehouse: Negotiations have been going on for some time. There are at present some 30 vacancies. I cannot estimate what the position will be in three or six months' time as the recruiting position fluctuates from month to month.

Mr. Dobson: While my right hon. Friend is aware that the recruiting situation fluctuates from month to month, is he aware that it takes about six months to get someone in to fill vacancies? As the shortage of staff is in part due to lack of progress over regrading proposals which are being held up by his Department, will he press for the settlement of these as soon as possible?

Mr. Stonehouse: I do not accept that regrading proposals are being held up in our Department. There has to be some very close consultation with the staff sides.

Welsh Language

Mr. James Griffiths: asked the Postmaster-General what consideration he has given to the use of the Welsh language on postal vans.

Mr. Stonehouse: Her Majesty the Queen has graciously agreed that the words "Royal Mail" should also appear in Welsh on postal vans garaged in Wales. The first vans with the dual inscription will appear in the Caernarvonshire area in time for the Investiture of the Prince of Wales.

Mr. Griffiths: Does my right hon. Friend appreciate that the Post Office will increase its prestige by using the Welsh language, the oldest living language in Europe, on its postal vans? May I say how much we appreciate the way in which the Government are fulfilling the promise which they made about furthering the use of the Welsh language in Wales?

Mr. Stonehouse: I thank my right hon Friend very much.

Mr. Gwynfor Evans: asked the Postmaster-General what plans he has to make greater use of the Welsh language on Post Office buildings, vehicles, public notices and publications in Wales.

Mr. Stonehouse: In reply to an earlier Question I have announced that we shall in future be using the Welsh language, in addition to English, on postal vans. We already make use of Welsh on buildings and in certain publications.

Mr. Evans: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that, although that Answer is welcome as far as it goes, it has been part of the Government's purpose in Wales to destroy the Welsh language and that one method employed has been to refuse to display it publicly on its property in Wales? Would the right hon. Gentleman change this policy in his Department?

Mr. Stonehouse: I do not accept what has been said. The Post Office has always provided forms and signs in Welsh, and we shall continue to do so.

Mr. Shinwell: If my right hon. Friend suffers from a mental aberration at some time and decides to implement the suggestion of the hon. Member for Carmarthen (Mr. Gwynfor Evans), will he ensure that the North of Scotland, where people speak Gaelic and some understand only Gaelic, is similarly treated?

Mr. Stonehouse: I am prepared to consider any such proposal, but whether we should do that remains to be seen.

Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications

Mr. Bryan: asked the Postmaster-General how many civil servants will be employed at the new Ministry of Posts and Telecommunications.

Mr. Stonehouse: About 400.

Mr. Bryan: Is the right hon. Gentleman aware that none of the explanations in Committee or elsewhere has convinced us why so many people are required to do so little and, in particular, why two Ministers are needed? Will he take a very serious look at this matter before vesting day to see whether the number can be reduced?

Mr. Stonehouse: I will consider it. We do not want an excess number of staff, but it must be remembered that the new Ministry will take over not only the sponsorship of the Post Office but the broadcasting responsibilities, which are becoming increasingly important in view of the review which must be conducted soon.

Oral Answers to Questions — WIRELESS AND TELEVISION

B.B.C. (Transmission Facilities)

Mr. Dudley Smith: asked the Postmaster-General (1) what requests he has now had for further transmission facilities for regional television and radio broadcasting by the British Broadcasting Corporaton;
(2)what request he has now had for assistance in improving the reception of British Broadcasting Corporation Radio 3.

Mr. Boston: asked the Postmaster-General what proposals he has now received from the British Broadcasting Corporation for changes in transmission arrangements arising from its review of radio services, and in particular British Broadcasting Corporation Radio 3.

Mr. Stonehouse: None, Sir.

Mr. Dudley Smith: Does the Postmaster-General agree that on both television and radio the B.B.C. regional stations set a very high standard and fulfil a public need? Will he impress

on those responsible that that high standard must be maintained with Radio 3 as well, and that the public would very much regret it if any decision were taken otherwise?

Mr. Stonehouse: I will ensure that the attention of the B.B.C. is drawn to those remarks.

Mr. Boston: Will my right hon. Friend agree that the statement made by the new Director-General of the B.B.C. is somewhat reassuring, but that there is real concern about the future of Radio 3? Will he agree that there is need to ensure that any changes which take place as the result of the review will not lead to a reduction in either quality or quantity, particularly of the music in the programme? Many people have bought very high frequency sets for the very purpose of enjoying this programme, and they need to be protected.

Mr. Stonehouse: I accept that these are all important points, and I am sure that the B.B.C. will have them all in mind. I will keep in touch with the position.

Mr. Tilney: Will the right hon. Gentleman also bear in mind that the cost of regional stations should not fall on the local rates?

Mr. Stonehouse: That must be considered in the light of the review of the experiment which, as the House knows, will be conducted during July.

B.B.C. and I.T.A. (Comment and Information)

Mr. Arthur Davidson: asked the Postmaster-General if he will introduce legislation to confer on the British Broadcasting Corporation and the Independent Television Authority power to broadcast comment and information more freely than the law at present allows them.

Mr. Stonehouse: No, Sir.

Mr. Davidson: Is my right hon. Friend aware that there is a feeling among current affairs producers that the I.T.A. sometimes acts as an inhibiting influence on them, delaying programmes on matters touching delicately sensitive areas? Would he agree that if there were any basis for that feeling, it would be a thoroughly undesirable state of affairs, because it would place television in a less


favourable position than newspapers in being able to comment freely and fairly on matters of public concern?

Mr. Stonehouse: I cannot accept my hon. Friend's premises or his conclusions.

Mr. C. Pannell: Does my right hon. Friend appreciate that the feeling which occurs to my hon. Friend has not occurred to us? Is he aware that we have never known the I.T.A. or the I.T.V. or any of those people to be particularly inhibited when dealing with him or anyone on the Front Bench?

Mr. Stonehouse: We have a situation in which these T.V. companies can promote some very good programmes. I am not aware that there is any particular restriction on them.

Television Transmissions (Yorkshire)

Mr. Richard Wainwright: asked the Postmaster-General what requests he has received from the British Broadcasting Corporation and the Independent Television Authority for assistance in enabling the full resumption of television transmissions in Yorkshire; and what action he proposes to take.

Mr. Stonehouse: None, Sir.

Mr. Wainwright: In the event of receiving requests, will the Minister beat in mind that there is inevitably only a small body of knowledge in this country or in Europe of the problems of extremely high structures operating under very difficult climatic conditions? Will he undertake, if asked, to marshall the resources of the Government to help?

Mr. Stonehouse: We have not been formally asked for assistance, but of course the assistance of the Post Office is available. We hope very much that full transmission by Yorkshire T.V. will be resumed very soon.

Mr. Bryan: Would the right hon. Gentleman take this opportunity of giving any further news about the situation in Yorkshire? For instance, has he any news when the new 680 ft. mast will be put up?

Mr. Stonehouse: We hope that it will be put up and be effective within two months.

Oral Answers to Questions — WALES

County Councils (Rating Function)

Mr. Anderson: asked the Secretary of State for Wales whether he will withdraw his proposal to transfer the rating function to county councils in Wales.

The Minister of State, Welsh Office (Mrs. Eirene White): Yes, Sir. In view of the unanimous opposition of the local authority associations and the almost unanimous opposition of the individual local authorities directly concerned, and because the proposal is not an integral part of the structure proposed for Wales, my right hon. Friend has decided not to proceed further with it in the context of the present proposals for local government reorganisation in Wales.

Mr. Anderson: May I congratulate my hon. Friend on being big enough to change her mind in the face of informed local opinion on this topic?

Mrs. White: As my hon. Friend is aware, there were very lengthy discussions on the matter, but I believe that my right hon. Friend has reached the right conclusion.

Mr. James Griffiths: Would my hon. Friend bear in mind in the discussions taking place that, if we are to have a two-tier structure in local government, it is essential that the second tier should have some responsibility and authority, otherwise it will be useless?

Mrs. White: It was for that reason that the Secretary of State reached this conclusion.

Local Government Reorganisation

Mr. Anderson: asked the Secretary of State for Wales what representations he has received from the Association of Municipal Corporations about the powers to be assigned to the district level in Welsh local government re-organisation; and what reply he has sent.

Mrs. White: The tenor of the Association's representations is that a wider range of functional responsibilities should be allocated to the district level. The Association have been told that their views will be carefully considered along with those of the other local authority associations.

Mr. Anderson: Is it not a fact that all the firm decisions so far taken amount to a shift to the county level and away from the district level and that there is a danger of taking away local government responsibility in Wales? If the district levels are left only with the more minor functions of parks, cemeteries, and so on, will not the right calibre of local councillor and official cease to be attracted to local government service?

Mrs. White: My hon. Friend is under a misapprehension because there has been no question of taking anything away other than what has been discussed in relation to the rating function. All the other functions appropriate to district councils will remain with them.

Mr. Gibson-Watt: asked the Secretary of State for Wales whether, without prejudice to any final scheme for local government reorganisation in Wales, he will seek to make housing one of the functions of the proposed new counties instead of leaving it with the proposed new district councils as laid down in the White Paper on Local Government in Wales.

Mrs. White: No, Sir. My right hon. Friend proposes to leave housing as a district level function.

Mr. Gibson-Watt: Would the hon. Lady say what further meetings her right hon. Friend intends to have with the local authorities concerned? Does she foresee that local government reform in Wales will take place fairly soon, or are the Government leaving it to the next Government to deal with it?

Mrs. White: As the hon. Gentleman knows, a series of meetings have been held with representatives of the local authorities and interests concerned. These meetings are continuing; they are not yet concluded. My right hon. Friend has indicated that if they wish to make any comments following the report of the Royal Commission on Local Government in England and Scotland it will be open to them to do so.

Welsh Rural Development Board

Mr. Gibson-Watt: asked the Secretary of State for Wales whether he now proposes to continue the Welsh Rural Development Board.

Mrs. White: Yes, Sir. I would refer the hon. Member to the Answer given yesterday to the hon. Member for Carmarthen (Mr. Gwynfor Evans).

Mr. Gibson-Watt: I saw that Answer and the report on the inquiry. However, in view of the widespread opposition to the Board in Wales, and since under this Government Boards are breeding in Mid-Wales like rabbits, would she ask her right hon. Friend to have another look at this one?

Mrs. White: I do not think that is in the least necessary. A very full and thorough investigation was held under the chairmanship of Sir Ben Bowen Thomas. I think that it lasted for 44 days. I should have thought that adequate investigation had already been made.

Mr. Gwynfor Evans: Is the hon. Lady aware that the Answer which I had yesterday was received with acclamation in Carmarthenshire, but with qualified dismay in Cardiganshire and with fury in the rest of the area upon which this wretched Board is to be imposed?

Mrs. White: It would be advisable if we were to wait to see what the attitude is after the Board has been in operation for some time. I think that then the sentiments described by the hon. Gentleman might be reversed.

Mr. James Griffiths: Is my hon. Friend aware that many of us support the decision made in the Report? I hope that my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State will keep the Board in being because it can do an immense amount to rehabilitate the Welsh language in the countryside of Wales.

Mrs. White: I entirely agree with my right hon. Friend. Those who take the attitude of hon. Gentlemen opposite are very ill advised.

Mr. Gibson-Watt: Could the hon. Lady tell us how much this famous inquiry cost the country?

Mrs. White: About £25,000. The cost was largely due to the amount of opposition stirred up by the hon. Gentleman and his hon. Friends.

Oral Answers to Questions — EDUCATION AND SCIENCE

Teachers' Salaries

Mr. Shinwell: asked the Secretary of State for Education and Science whether he is aware of the discontent among members of the teaching profession about the decision of the Burnham Committee on salary scales; and whether he will take steps to appoint an independent inquiry to consider the problems facing teachers whose salaries compare unfavourably with members of other professions with similar qualifications.

The Minister of State, Department of Education and Science (Miss Alice Bacon): The Burnham Primary and Secondary Committee recently concluded an agreement in free negotiation between the management and teachers' panels. Some teachers are no doubt dissatisfied with the agreement, but it was ratified by most of the teachers' associations and is certainly the best which incomes policy would permit. My right hon. Friend has no plans for an inquiry.

Mr. Shinwell: Is my right hon. Friend aware that a substantial number of the National Union of Teachers, which, by a majority, accepted the decision of the Burnham Committee, and the National Association of Schoolmasters and other education bodies have objected to the decision of the Burnham Committee? In some parts of the country education authorities have made an arrangement with members of the National Association of Schoolmasters. There is no victimisation and salaries have been paid. However, the education committee of the Durham County Council is in dispute with the N.A.S., and this has created a great deal of alarm among parents whose children are not being properly educated.

Miss Bacon: My right hon. Friend has a further Question down about the latter part of his supplementary question. However, he is under a misapprehension. It is true that the N.A.S. did not agree with the decision reached by the Burnham Committee, but the National Union of Teachers accepted it at a special conference. Yesterday, my right hon. Friend met, at its request, a deputation from the National Association of Schoolmasters and discussed the matter.

Mr. Dudley Smith: Is the Minister aware that, in addition to being very worried about their salaries, many teachers are also concerned about their career prospects, and therefore there is a good case for an independent inquiry as indicated by the right hon. Gentleman's Question?

Miss Bacon: Yes. If there were a consensus of opinion in favour of an inquiry my right hon. Friend would be prepared to consider it, but at the moment that is not so. As I have said, my right hon. Friend saw the N.A.S. yesterday. Career prospects are bound up with the salary question. It is a very complicated matter and raises the whole question of salaries and so on for men and women.

Sir G. Nabarro: Will the Minister bear in mind that, in the event of an independent inquiry, the vital sector of the teaching profession comprising university staff, the dons and lecturers, ought to be included, for they are writhing in discontent at present at the 3 per cent. basis of increase announced a few months ago?

Miss Bacon: That is another question, because the Burnham Committee did not deal with university teaching staff salaries.

Acre Rigg School, Peterlee (Dispute)

Mr. Shinwell: asked the Secretary of State for Education and Science what representations he has received from the parents' association regarding the dispute affecting Acre Rigg School in Peterlee; and what action he proposes to take.

Miss Bacon: Like my right hon. Friend I have received a copy of letters sent by the association to the Easington exempted district and to the local education authority. There is no action open to me at present.

Mr. Shinwell: But, after all, my right hon. Friend and her right hon. Friend have a responsibility for curricula and for the appointment of teachers in all the schools under the Education Act. Surely they must accept that responsibility and try to bring the dispute to an end.

Miss Bacon: We very much deplore the dispute that has arisen, but it is between the teachers and their employers and can be settled only in that


context. I should add that the Government's conciliation officers would respond to any joint indication from both sides in the local dispute.

Oral Answers to Questions — BOARD OF TRADE

Auction rings

Mr. A. Royle: asked the President of the Board of Trade what request he has received to publish his Report on auction rings from the Society of London Art Dealers.

The Minister of State, Board of Trade (Mr. Edmund Dell): My right hon. Friend has received no request for publication from this Society. They wrote to my right hon. Friend on 24th February asking whether the Report would be published.

Mr. Royle: Is it not true that that letter specifically agreed that the Report by the President of the Board of Trade should be published, and does the Minister agree that the Society of London Art Dealers gave the closest co-operation to his Department both before and during the inquiry?

Mr. Dell: The letter in question asked whether the Report would be published. The Society of London Art Dealers, as the hon. Gentleman knows, met an official of my Department on 30th September to give what information they had, and members of the Society subsequently gave evidence during the course of the inquiry.

Mr. A. Royle: asked the President of the Board of Trade why his officials refused an offer by the Sunday Times to witness an art auction ring; and why neither Mr. Colin Simpson nor Mr. Nicholas Tomalin was interviewed during his Department's inquiry.

Mr. Dell: No such offer was made either before or in the course of the Board's inquiries into auction rings. Moreover if, as appears to be implied, the Sunday Times had advance information of the operation of an auction ring, it was their clear duty to bring this information to the attention of the Director of Public Prosecutions or the police. As regards the second part of the question, I have nothing to add to my Answer to the right hon. Member for Reigate (Sir.

J. Vaughan-Morgan) on 25th March—[Vol. 780, c. 267–8.]

Mr. Royle: Is not this a most extraordinary statement? Is the Minister aware that the Sunday Times, in a major article, detailed the operations of a ring at Aldwick Court? Is it not astonishing that neither he nor any of his officials went out of their way to take evidence or to see the people who wrote the article and to discuss the matter with them?

Mr. Dell: Journalists of the Sunday Times visited the Board of Trade before the inquiry was launched. During the course of the inquiry evidence was taken, as I said in my Answer to the right hon. Member for Reigate, from all those people who seemed likely to be able to give useful information about art auctions. We do not propose to disclose the names of the people who gave evidence.

Mr. Gibson-Watt: Yes; but the hon. Gentleman gave a very unsatisfactory Answer to my hon. Friend. We had hoped to hear a great deal more on this subject this morning. Why is it that the hon. Gentleman's Department has been totally unable to accept the help which has been forthcoming from so many quarters?

Mr. Dell: As the hon. Gentleman knows, an inquiry was made. In addition, a Bill is being considered by the House which I hope will be of value in this respect. As the hon. Gentleman should know, the reason why we cannot publish the Report has been explained to the House many times. Those reasons remain valid.

Mr. Brooks: Does my hon. Friend agree that there is some contradiction here because, among the reasons given for not publishing the Board of Trade Report, was the argument that there might be statements of a defamatory character? As last week we had a Report published which had carried out investigations of such seriousness that the documents have been forwarded to the Director of Public Prosecutions, would it not be advisable for the House of Commons to have a consistent policy applied to the publication of documents and reports of this character?

Mr. Dell: I do not know of any inconsistency in this matter. The problem


about publication—and this is the main reason why publication cannot be made—is that to do so would cause injustice to individuals who would not be able to defend themselves. I well understand and share the public interest in this matter and in the Report, but there is an even greater public interest in not doing injustice to individuals in these circumstances.

Mr. Royle: In view of the totally unsatisfactory nature of that reply, I beg leave to give notice that I shall seek to raise the matter on the Adjournment at the earliest possible opportunity.

Sir J. Vaughan-Morgan: asked the President of the Board of Trade what request he has received to publish his Report on auction rings from the British Antique Dealers' Association.

Mr. Dell: The Association wrote to the Board of Trade supporting publication of the Report subject to the legal difficulties.

Sir J. Vaughan-Morgan: Can the hon. Gentleman explain why the Association wrote and stressed the legal difficulties in particular? Furthermore, does he realise that failure to produce a Report giving the general conclusions on what was found in regard not to a specific ring or auction sale but to the general matter is causing the rumours which have been spread about certain people to be given even wider circulation?

Mr. Dell: The British Antique Dealers' Association referred to the legal difficulties because, just before writing to me, it had read the statement that I made in Committee on the Bill.
On the general conclusions, my right hon. Friend made a statement to the House some weeks ago.

Sir J. Vaughan-Morgan: asked the President of the Board of Trade what request he has received to publish his Report on auction rings from Mr. Julius Weitzner.

Mr. Dell: None.

Mr. Channon: asked the President of the Board of Trade whether he will give an assurance that he will now lay the Report on Auction Rings in response to an order for an unopposed return.

Mr. Dell: Such publication would not avoid possible injustice to persons named in the Report who will not be charged, and who consequently will not have the safeguards afforded to defendants at a criminal trial. In addition, while it would afford the protection of absolute privilege to my right hon. Friend and Her Majesty's Stationery Office, it would give no such protection against proceedings for defamation to those persons whose statements are recorded in the Report.

Mr. Channon: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that that reply will be received with astonishment by people outside this House? Since it was obvious before the inquiry was set up that no criminal proceedings could be taken in the matter, will the hon. Gentleman say why this ludicrous form of inquiry was set up and not another, as was suggested?

Mr. Dell: I do not think that the statement will be regarded with astonishment. It is a plain statement about the danger of causing injustice to individuals which I think this House would wish to avoid.

Mr. C. Pannell: Will my hon. Friend bring his Answer to the attention of the Leader of the House as an added reason why we should speedily adopt the Report of the Select Committee on Privilege which has been hanging over for so long? Quite often wrongs might be righted if we acted with more alacrity on Reports which hon. Members spend about two years preparing.

Mr. Dell: I am sure that my right hon. Friend the Leader of the House will note my right hon. Friend's question.

Mr. A. Royle: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that my hon. Friend is correct in saying that the Minister's statement will be received with astonishment? Can the hon. Gentleman explain why the Government published the Bristol Siddeley Report if they are not prepared to publish this one, using the same method? The Minister's statement is extraordinary.

Mr. Dell: The Bristol Siddeley Report was of an entirely different character from the Board's inquiry into the possible existence of art auction rings. The Bristol Siddeley Report neither named individual witnesses nor published their statements.

Mr. Brooks: But the Bristol Siddeley inquiry identified individuals against whom the most serious allegations were made and it would have been possible to put names to those individuals. Will my hon. Friend agree that there are close parallels between the two cases?

Mr. Dell: The main difference is that in the Bristol Siddeley Report no statements by individuals were published. I must again emphasise that the great danger in publishing this Report is that of doing injustice to individuals, and I am surprised that the House seems to pay so little attention to that.

Sir J. Vaughan-Morgan: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that not only the hon. Member for Bebington (Mr. Brooks), but I, too, was on the Committee which dealt with the Bristol Siddeley matter, and that what he has just said in his reply is not factually true?

Mr. Dell: I take it that my hon. Friend the Member for Bebington (Mr. Brooks) is referring not to the Report of the P.A.C. but to the Report of the Wilson Committee.

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: Is it not a fact that subsequent to the publication of the Wilson Committee's Report the Government identified two of the individuals concerned by inflicting heavy penalties on them?

Mr. Dell: That is so. As a matter of fact, as the House knows, there was criticism even of the publication of the Bristol Siddeley Report. I think that publication of the Report under discussion would be a good deal more susceptible of criticism.

Mr. John Mendelson: Will my hon. Friend accept that the House is fully cognisant of the difficulties of protecting the rights of individuals? Will he accept, too, that this reply leaves the House and the country in a most unsatisfactory position at the end of what is regarded by many people, both inside the House and outside, as a very smelly operation? Will my hon. Friend therefore keep it in mind that it is not good enough to try to teach us about the rights of individuals? It is up to the Government to make sure that, with great speed, an inquiry is conducted to see to it that our art market in London has its reputation fully restored.

Mr. Dell: I do not say that the situation is satisfactory, but it is important that the House should have regard to the importance of not doing injustice to individuals. We have had an inquiry into the operation of auction rings in this country. As my hon. Friend knows, nothing arising out of that inquiry was of a character which it would have been useful to refer to the Director of Public Prosecutions.

Mr. Channon: The hon. Gentleman has been talking about causing injustice to individuals. Is he not aware that he is doing the greatest possible injustice to the whole of the reputable art trade in this country by not clearing up this matter and removing the mess of suspicion that is surrounding all its operations?

Mr. Dell: In his statement to the House my right hon. Friend made it clear that there was no reason why the reputation of the London art market should be in any way reduced by anything produced during the course of the inquiry. It seems to me that it is these continual questions on this point by hon. Gentlemen opposite that brings in the question of that reputation, which we wish to maintain.

Oral Answers to Questions — TECHNOLOGY

Upper Clydeside Shipyards (Minister's Visit)

Mr. Edward M. Taylor: asked the Minister of Technology if he will make a statement on his recent visit to shipyards in Upper Clydeside.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Technology (Mr. Gerry Fowler): When visiting the shipyards on the Upper Clyde on 14th March, my right hon. Friend and I talked with all concerned about the difficulties facing the industry there and how they might be resolved. We were encouraged by the positive response we received.

Mr. Taylor: Is the hon. Gentleman aware that considerable alarm has been caused on Clydeside by the conference speech of a senior Scottish trade union official to the effect that the Government had guaranteed the life of Upper Clyde Shipbuilders for a period of only 14 weeks? As the livelihoods of thousands


of families are at stake, did the hon. Gentleman's visit give him grounds for optimism that the required targets and objectives would be met?

Mr. Fowler: My right hon. Friend and I would not have visited the Upper Clyde if we did not believe in the ultimate success of the Upper Clyde Shipbuilders. We thought it wise to go there to stress to all concerned that the success of the Upper Clyde depended on their efforts as well as on ours, and I think that we got the message across very successfully.

Oral Answers to Questions — MEMBERS (DUTIES AND RESPONSIBILITIES)

Mr. Ellis: asked the Prime Minister if he will introduce legislation to set up an independent committee to inquire into the existing scope of the duties and responsibilities of Members of Parliament and to recommend measures whereby Members could be assisted in the discharge of these duties and responsibilities and the public could be informed of those interests of Members for which they receive payment in addition to their Parliamentary salary.

The Prime Minister (Mr. Harold Wilson): On the remuneration of Members I would refer my hon. Friend to what I said in the House on 11th March. On the disclosure of Members' interests I would refer to my statement in the House on 26th March.

Mr. Ellis: My right hon. Friend has forgotten certain other parts of the Question relating to duties and assistance in the discharge of those duties. Whatever the merits of outside jobs, to many hon. Members this is a full-time occupation. Not only are we getting mud slung at us, but the more diligent an hon. Member is in pursuing his duties the more it costs him to discharge those duties. We are asking, not for more money, but for better facilities so that we can give the public a better service. If the Government will not accept the evidence—

Mr. Speaker: Order. Questions, however important, must be brief.

Mr. Ellis: I am sorry, Mr. Speaker. If the Government will not accept the evidence of hon. Members, perhaps we can have some independent people from

outside to tell the public exactly what is needed.

The Prime Minister: My hon. Friend is making a fair point, but when I use the phrase "remuneration of Members" I naturally intend that to include any help to be given in a form other than an increase in remuneration to deal with help to hon. Members in the pursuance of their duties. This is being continually considered by the Services Committee, and in other ways. I accept that my hon. Friend has a point.

Oral Answers to Questions — RHODESIA

Mr. Molloy: asked the Prime Minister if he will make a further statement on Rhodesia.

The Prime Minister: I have nothing to add to the reply by my right hon. Friend the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary to a question by the hon. Member for Haltemprice (Mr. Wall) on 24th March.

Mr. Molloy: Will my right hon. Friend acknowledge that in comparison with other parts of the world where we have administrative responsibility and where there has been a minor misdemeanour recently, this rebel régime in Rhodesia has been getting away with murder, and that the present lull is a dangerous situation which could lead to conflagration in Africa and possibly endanger world peace unless we strive to find a solution?

The Prime Minister: There is a continuing danger of conflagration in Africa, as has been acknowledged by many hon. Members, as long as there is no settlement which fulfils the principles which the House has laid down. My hon. Friend will be aware that the "Fearless" terms are available to be picked up, and in any constitutional controversy in Rhodesia they remain as the standing alternative to some of the totally unacceptable and apartheid-based proposals which have been canvassed in that country.

Mr. Rose: In view of the alacrity with which we acted in Anguilla, and because of the unfavourable comparisons which are being made, will my right hon. Friend say how long he intends this business to go on, and whether he will


place a time-limit on the "Fearless" proposals?

The Prime Minister: I do not know whether he intended it, but the implication of my hon. Friend's question appears to be that the use of force after a considerable period of time and a rejection of the "Fearless" terms would be justified. I have never accepted that, and I refer my hon. Friend to what my right hon. Friend the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary said on this matter. It would be a recipe for a much more certain and wider conflagration in Southern Africa.

Oral Answers to Questions — NIGERIA

Mr. Barnes: asked the Prime Minister if he will make a statement on his visit to Lagos.

Mr. Frank Allaun: asked the Prime Minister if he will make a statement on the latest move to secure a ceasefire in Nigeria.

Mr. James Johnson: asked the Prime Minister if he will make a statement upon his visit to Federal Nigeria.

Mr. Frank Allaun: asked the Prime Minister if he will make a statement on his visit to Nigeria.

The Prime Minister: I would refer my hon. Friends to the statement which I made in the House yesterday.

Mr. Barnes: My right hon. Friend will appreciate the great interest that there is in the moves that took place to try to get a meeting between himself and Colonel Ojukwu. Can my right hon. Friend say why Mr. Malcolm MacDonald and the Under-Secretary of State did not visit Biafra to discuss the arrangements for a meeting face-to-face with the Biafrans, in view of the fact that this visit was requested by the British Government and agreed to by the Biafrans?

The Prime Minister: That was not proposed by the British Government. I have seen a full record of what was said. It was suggested that this might be one way of setting it up, but by the Sunday after my consultations with the Federal Government it became clear that the speediest method would be to make proposals

for a meeting on the Monday or the Tuesday. On Monday morning I said that I would fly back on the Wednesday. This would only have taken more time. Also, on examining the situation on the spot, I was not satisfied about the security and other arrangements which would have been appropriate for such a visit through the fighting lines.

Mr. Johnson: I welcome 100 per cent. what my right hon. Friend said yesterday, but may I ask him whether he found that General Gowan was fully aware of the dangers implicit in this indiscriminate bombing and the impression that it is making on public opinion outside?

The Prime Minister: I referred to that point yesterday. As my hon. Friend knows, I pointed out that I made these representations in the strongest terms because I think this a matter of deep concern to the House. I do not think that one can say, in a hard-fought war, that no bombing should take place. It is a question of weighing the military advantage of bombing against severe political damage in Nigeria, and more widely, resulting from incidents which involve the death of innocent civilians.

Mr. Braine: Is the Prime Minister aware that we all recognise the formidable difficulty of getting a cease-fire accepted by both sides, and that this is unlikely unless there is an acceptance of the sincerity of both sides, including the Biafrans? Is he further aware that we all regret the fact that for one reason or another he was unable to see Colonel Ojukwu? Is the position still that he would welcome such a meeting if it could be arranged?

The Prime Minister: It is certainly not ruled out. One of the big difficulties here undoubtedly was—on the side of Colonel Ojukwu—the relatively short time in which a meeting in West Africa could be arranged. I certainly would not rule out a meeting if I thought that it would be helpful. The Federal Government raised no objection in principle to my proposals.

Mr. James Griffiths: In reply to a Question of mine yesterday my right hon. Friend said that the best next course for Colonel Ojukwu and everybody would lie in the meeting being held of the O.A.U. later this month. Would he feel disposed to make representations that it


would be a good thing if the O.A.U. invited Colonel Ojukwu to attend that meeting?

The Prime Minister: It is not for me to interfere in the internal arrangements of the U.A.U. One knows the great sensitivities which operate here. I have discussed these matters in considerable detail with the Secretariat of the O.A.U. and with the Emperor. My impression is—I do not want to speak for them or to put words into their mouths—that they look forward to the possibility of getting both sides round the table as a result of the meeting in Monrovia.

Mr. David Steel: The Prime Minister said that he would not rule out the possibility of a meeting with Colonel Ojukwu, but yesterday he referred twice to matters that he would have wished to discuss with him. Could not he therefore show greater determination to seek a meeting between Colonel Ojukwu and the British Government, if it could be arranged?

The Prime Minister: It is important to try to assess the reasons why this meeting did not take place. That is one of the factors which would have to be taken into consideration in deciding the Government's attitude to the hon. Member's suggestion.

Mr. Philip Noel-Baker: Is my right hon. Friend aware that what he will forgive me for calling his some facile pessimism about an arms ban is deeply frustrating to many hon. Members and to many people in the country? Is he aware that general arms bans have been imposed in the past and have succeeded? If the Consultative Committee provides no result in two weeks' time, will he consider going himself to New York, inviting Mr. Kosygin to go with him, and trying to secure the only measure which is likely to bring the war to an end?

The Prime Minister: There is no pessimism in this matter, facile or otherwise. There is realism. My study of this question goes back to reading a book by my right hon. Friend more than 30 years ago on this very question. He will remember what he said about the private traffic in arms. Despite the efforts of many Governments to stop it, the private traffic in arms is now on a far larger scale than when he wrote his book. That

is one reason why, to be realistic, I feel that a Resolution of the Security Council, even if it could be obtained, would not be effective in stopping what would probably be a one-sided arms supply. Large arms supplies appear to be reaching Nigeria by a somewhat circuitous route, and I am not certain that it would be possible to deal with that by way of a resolution.

Oral Answers to Questions — ORDER OF THE BRITISH EMPIRE

Mr. Brooks: asked the Prime Minister whether, in view of the ending of the British Empire, he will advise that appropriate changes should be made in the name, Order of the British Empire.

The Prime Minister: I have nothing to add to the Answer which I gave to a similar Question by my hon. Friend the Member for West Ham, North (Mr. Arthur Lewis) on 2nd February, 1967.

Mr. Brooks: Does not my right hon. Friend agree that although the Thistle, the Garter and the Bath are still with us, the British Empire is not, and that it might be a good idea, in view of the offence which this gives to the spirit of the new Commonwealth, to consider performing a ritual sacrifice?

The Prime Minister: I do not think that it is a question of the archaic character of certain names. I would not want to get into an argument with my hon. Friend in the House about the present sartorial standing of the Garter in respect of its common use by both sexes. There is no British Empire, in the sense in which it existed when the Order was created. I have given this matter long consideration and have had some consultations about it. I cannot see any evidence that the title is currently not welcomed among members of the Commonwealth, or in foreign countries, or in this country. I have considered many alternative names and I have not found any which are entirely suitable—and there is always the problem of the initials to be put after recipients' names. If my hon. Friend has a good suggestion I shall be prepared to look at it.

Mr. Tilney: Is it not time that there was a Commonwealth medal, stemming


from the Head of the Commonwealth as such, and awarded on the advice of Commonwealth Presidents and Prime Ministers?

The Prime Minister: One difficulty about that is that the Head of the Commonwealth is in two different relationships to various Commonwealth members. To those who remain monarchies she—or the Governor-General, acting in her name—is the fount of honour but in the case of countries with Presidents she is not the fount of honour, and there would be great difficulty in trying to get a single Commonwealth approach. As the hon. Member knows, in countries which remain monarchic in their constitutions there have been decisions by the Parliaments concerned not to accept honours of this kind.

Oral Answers to Questions — OCEAN ENVIRONMENT (DEVELOPMENT)

Mr. Dalyell: asked the Prime Minister when he now expects to publish the Government's White Paper on the development of the ocean environment.

The Prime Minister: I would refer my hon. Friend to the reply given on my behalf by my right hon. Friend the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary to a question by the hon. Member for Paddington, South (Mr. Scott) last Tuesday.

Mr. Dalyell: Is the Prime Minister aware that whereas few of us expect him to set up a Ministry of Ocean Affairs, or even to appoint a Minister of State, there is a problem in that 11 different Ministries have a significant interest in the development of the marine environment? Is it not time to concentrate responsibility, and might not, on reflection, the best Department in which to concentrate responsibility be the Navy Department, which has control of a considerable amount of the relevant hardware?

The Prime Minister: The reason why a number of Ministries are involved—and we have the same problem in relation to more celestial affairs as well as ocean affairs—is that 11 different subjects which are the responsibility of Ministries are involved in a full consideration of this matter. I would regret

to see any proposition under which my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs was relieved of his responsibilities here, because of the keen desire of all of us—certainly of Her Majesty's Government—to deal with the problem of safeguarding the sea from use for nuclear purposes.

Sir H. Legge-Bourke: Will the Prime Minister give an assurance that he will not come to a final decision in this matter until the Select Committee on Science and Technology has had an opportunity of reporting on the work that it will be doing in the remainder of this Session after Easter?

The Prime Minister: Yes. I am grateful to the hon. Member. The Government look forward to the Report of the Select Committee with keen interest.

Mr. Lubbock: Is not the first problem to resolve—as the right hon. Gentleman implied in his answer to the last question—the ownership of the ocean bed resources? Can he say what fresh proposals Her Majesty's Government are making in the United Nations to resolve this matter?

The Prime Minister: No fresh proposals. I have already reported to the House on the discussions at the United Nations. The United Nations Resolution on the Decade proposal, which was tabled by the United States and cosponsored by us, was adopted without a vote and without objection by the General Assembly last December. We now proceed to act within that Resolution.

Oral Answers to Questions — COMMERCIAL RADIO STATIONS

Mr. Boston: asked the Prime Minister what discussions he has had with the Chairman of the British Broadcasting Corporation about the progress of the experiment in local sound radio; and if he will give an assurance that he will not seek to set up local commercial radio stations.

The Prime Minister: None, Sir. On the second part of the Question, I have nothing to add to my answer to my hon. Friend and to other hon. Members on 20th March.

Mr. Boston: Will my right hon. Friend accept that there will be a widespread welcome to the resounding rejection by the new Director-General of the B.B.C. of the idea of advertising on B.B.C. programmes? Does he also recall that the vast bulk of representations to the Pilkington Committee by local newspaper interests was against local commercial radio, and does not he think it odd that the Leader of the Opposition is still showing uncharacteristic modesty in not seizing upon a proposal of one of his own shadow Ministers for 100 commercial radio stations?

The Prime Minister: On the first question, I am sure that the House will welcome the very robust statement by the new Director-General of the British Broadcasting Corporation. The House will be grateful to my hon. Friend, on the second point, for drawing attention to the evidence given by local newspapers about the effect on them of such proposals. On the third point, I have no responsibility for the Leader of the Opposition.

Mr. Bryan: Does the right hon. Gentleman remember and agree with the statement of the last Postmaster-General but one, when opening the Leicester station, that it would be unfair to pay for local stations out of the income from the general licence?

The Prime Minister: Yes, Sir, I do remember that, and we are, of course, awaiting the results of the review which will take place on the first period of operations of the local stations. My impression

of those which I have seen is that they are working extremely well, but they are not being financed anything like entirely—some of them, not even as to a majority—by payment out of the licence. Many local interests are contributing to the work of these stations and getting good value for their money.

Oral Answers to Questions — QUESTIONS TO MINISTERS

Mr. Speaker: Statement, Mrs. Castle.

Mr. Hunt: On a point of order. Have you had any notification from the Prime Minister, Mr. Speaker, that he wishes to answer the very important question No. Q8, particularly as the Postmaster-General is present and is no doubt as anxious to hear the Answer as I am? Before we break up for the Easter Recess, are not he and I entitled to an Answer?

Mr. Speaker: If I had had such a request, I should not have called the right hon. Lady the First Secretary to make a Statement.

The Prime Minister: Further to that point of order. The reason that you have not received any representations, Mr. Speaker, is that my right hon. Friend the Foreign and Commonwealth Secretary answered this precise Question in answer to my hon. Friend the Member for West Ham, North (Mr. Arthur Lewis) last Tuesday. In those circumstances, I thought representations unnecessary.

Mr. Edward M. Taylor: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. We cannot pursue this matter now. Mrs. Castle.

PRICES AND INCOMES BOARD'S REPORT (TOP SALARIES)

The First Secretary of State and Secretary of State for Employment and Productivity (Mrs. Barbara Castle): With permission, Mr. Speaker, I wish to announce the Government's decisions on the recommendations in the N.B.P.I. Report 107, which is concerned with top salaries in the private sector and in the nationalised industries.
The Report reviews the application of incomes policy to movements in top salaries in private industry in the last three years and concludes that a measure of restraint has been exercised. However, the Board says that many companies are inclined to over-emphasise the importance of external comparisons when determining pay, with self-defeating results; what is required is the establishment of salary structures
… which aim primarily to induce internally the assumption of greater responsibility and, consistently with the structure, to reward performance.
The Board considers that the salaries of individuals can be judged properly only in relation to the salary structures in which they are placed.
The Government accept the Board's conclusions. It is clearly vital that full account should be taken of the prices and incomes policy in settling salaries at senior as well as junior levels. My Department will apply the principles suggested when examining proposals for salary increases and will consider, in consultation with the C.B.I. and T.U.C., the reference to the Board of salary structures of individual firms.
I turn now to the recommendations of the Board in relation to top salaries in the nationalised industries. It has for long been recognised that the level of top salaries in the nationalised industries has been too low. This is not just the view of the N.B.P.I. The House's own Select Committee on the Nationalised Industries said in its Report last year:
The present rules must be abandned and a new start made toward fixing and paying a proper rate for the job"—
and said that it believed
… that the proper rate for the job must be significantly higher than that which is now generally paid.

The Committee added:
The State cannot afford to manage its public industries on the cheap. There is too much at stake.
The Government fully accept the broad analysis made by the Board of the principles on which top salaries should be fixed in the nationalised sector. They agree that the present top salaries are at a level at which they are likely in the long run to have detrimental effects on the quality of management in these vital industries, particularly since the salaries of board members do not provide sufficient headroom for appropriate pay for senior management. They also accept that there is no need to fix salaries in the nationalised industries simply by reference to salaries paid in organisations of a similar size in the private sector.
The Government are satisfied that the Board's recommendations on the level of these salaries are also right in principle and should be implemented when the requirements of incomes policy allow.
The Government are, however, quite clear that at a time when they are requiring all workers in the country to show restraint in pay increases within the terms of the White Paper it would be wrong to allow increases in top salaries in nationalised industries which might be inconsistent with the prices and incomes policy. The Board iself recognises this in its Report.
The Board, therefore, recommends that, as from 1st April, 1969, the pay of board members should be increased on average by amounts equivalent to an overall annual rate of 2½ per cent. since they were last raised in 1964. Since the 3½ per cent. ceiling is applied to all workers as an annual rate since their last pay increase, the Board's recommendations for this group of salaries fall well within the ceiling.
The Government, therefore, accept the Board's recommendations that this increase on 1st April should be implemented, as it would be within the ceiling.
As the Board itself recognises, however, the further increases in top salaries in the nationalised industries which it recommends will need to be considered in the light of the developments in incomes policy over the next two years. The Government will review the situation in the light of those developments.
The Board's other recommendations affecting the nationalised industries will be the subject of further study and consultation with the chairmen of the boards concerned.

Mr. Maudling: The right hon. Lady will recognise that this statement is complicated and possibly a little delicate in places and that, therefore, we will wish to study it with considerable care before coming to final conclusions. However, I should like to put one or two points to her. First of all, is it right to draw the conclusion from what she said that the Government accept that the only possible criticism of top salaries in private industry is that companies may, from time to time, have paid too much attention to the need for paying competitive rates to maintain the best people? That appears to me to be what her statement means, and that implies very much also, does it not, to the position in the nationalised industries? In the light of what the P.I.B. has said, can she really assure the House that the Government will be able to obtain and retain people of adequate quality for the top posts in the nationalised industries on this basis? Is her statement really consistent with the recommendation of the Board in paragraphs 93 and 94 of that Report?

Mrs. Castle: The way that the right hon. Gentleman put the position in his opening remarks is not correct. I do not think that he has adequately represented the Prices and Incomes Board's own view. It has said quite categorically that it is a self-defeating process to go for high salaries on a competitive basis. The Government accept its view on this and believe that the important thing is for industries to have salary structures which adequately reward performance and efficiency.
With regard to the nationalised industries, clearly the same principles apply, but what we need here is to give some head room for the working out of proper salary structures beneath board level, relating pay and performance very closely and rewarding responsibility. That is why we are prepared to implement an increase on 1st April which will be within the ceiling, but we retain the right to review the further increases which the Board recommends in the

light of the developments of the next two years.

Mr. Maudling: May I press the right hon. Lady on the first point, on which she said that I had misunderstood? What is the good of paying people something appropriate to their performance if it is not enough to retain their services?

Mrs. Castle: Because this is just what the Board points out—that this competitive bidding is in the end self-defeating and is equivalent to the kind of leapfrogging in wage increases lower down the line which we have all spent a great deal of time in the House condemning.

Mr. C. Pannell: Will my right hon. Friend understand that, however much she qualifies it, a great many of us on this side will consider this statement completely mistimed and that it would have been far better to hold the statement until she was able to tell us that the prices and incomes policy was at an end? Does she realise that it will be considered in the country that giving way on this is like removing a wedge from a log jam which may affect the whole of industry?

Mrs. Castle: I cannot agree with my right hon. Friend. It is appropriate that the principles of the prices and incomes policy should apply universally. If we were to run away from doing this we would get ourselves into a situation which would reduce the efficiency and capacity of the nationalised industries. There are area board chairmen in, for example, the gas and electricity industries whose salaries of £4,500 a year have not been increased for five years. The trade unions in our movement would bitterly Wilson added.—[Mr. Fitch.]

Mr. Boyd-Carpenter: Arising out of what the right hon. Lady has said, is not the difficulty in which the Government now find themselves due to their failure to act in this matter for several years? Indeed, have not the nationalised industries suffered severely in terms of efficiency as a result of the compression of their salary structures at the higher level?

Mrs. Castle: I agree with the right hon. Gentleman that the compression of salary structures is producing management dangers. The Prices and Incomes


Board referred to this and the Government accept it as being a very real problem. It is true, I think, of both sides of the House that there is always reluctance to adjust salaries in this sector. As the Select Committee on Nationalised Industries unanimously pointed out, the result is that we have been running these vital nationalised concerns on the cheap. The Select Committee therefore advocated that this situation should be remedied.

Mr. Edwin Wainwright: While accepting that the salaries of nationalised industry chairmen have not, with the exception of one, been comparable with salaries paid in private industry for many years, would my right hon. Friend remember that an increase of 2½ per cent. on the sort of salaries about which she has been speaking is a huge sum of money? Is she aware that increases of this kind will not be looked upon kindly by, for example, members of the brick-workers' union who were refused a 1d. increase? Will she also keep in mind the impact that these increases are bound to have on people throughout the country and the trend for higher wages which will result and which will absolutely abolish the prices and incomes policy?

Mrs. Castle: I cannot accept my hon. Friend's conclusions. There are, of course, different pay and salary levels in this country, and I do not believe that any hon. Member has ever advocated uniform wage and salary levels. We must apply the prices and incomes policy fairly and, as I pointed out in my statement, these increases are equivalent to a sum less than the cumulative ceiling since the last increase.
In operating the prices and incomes policy, I have frequently authorised this type of increase. There was the recent Wages Council case in which an increase of 9·6 per cent. was authorised because there had not been an increase for three years. This is the principle on which the prices and incomes policy is operated.

Sir G. Nabarro: Is the right hon. Lady aware that in the instance of the Group A nationalised industry chairmen her award of 2½ per cent.—namely, £312 10s. a year—compares with the P.I.B.'s recommendation of an increase of £7,500 a year? Is she aware, therefore, that she is awarding £1 against

the £24 increase recommended by the Board? Would she explain how this can conceivably lead to the additional headroom which is so urgently needed in these industries for the lesser executives who are, nevertheless, important members of top management?

Mrs. Castle: The hon. Gentleman has misunderstood the position. I am announcing the authorisation of the increase from 1st April of what was recommended by the P.I.B. This represents an average annual rate of 2½ per cent. since the last increase for these chairmen. However, I entirely agree with the hon. Gentleman that this increase on 1st April will represent a rise of only about £400 a year in the net income of those concerned.

Mr. Orme: Would not my right hon. Friend agree that her endeavour to fetch these increases within the tortuous criteria of the prices and incomes policy makes absolute nonsense? Is she aware that to talk about a 2½ per cent. increase for people on £12,000 a year, when one thinks of what such an increase represents for people on £10 a week, only adds to the feeling of inequality and resentment in industry today? Is she saying that we must await a further decision about the prices and incomes policy before the second half of the report is made; and when will she make a report to the House? In other words, when will the Government make a clear statement about dropping the prices and incomes policy?

Mrs. Castle: The answer to the first part of my hon. Friend's question is that he really is wrong when he says that industry—presumably he means the Trade Union movement—resents the application of the percentage principle under the prices and incomes policy. On the contrary, I am constantly being bombarded by trade unionists about the need to maintain differentials through the application of the percentage system.
We would have a trade union revolt if I were to say that the percentage principle must not apply and if the differentials were narrowed. I am constantly being presented with examples at work level of how, for example, the differentials applying to supervisors have had inroads made in them by wage awards given to the chaps under them.


In those circumstances I am asked immediately to widen the differentials. I remind my hon. Friend that the sacredness of the differential was reaffirmed in the Economic Review of the T.U.C. Are we to say that there is some level of salary at which the differential principle should not apply? If so, I would be interested to hear at what point we should draw the line. What we have done in this case by accepting the increases recommended by the P.I.B. for 1st April is not to apply the ceiling equally to these board members and chairmen. On the contrary, it works out at less than 3½ per cent. per year.
The answer to the second part of my hon. Friend's question is, "Yes, that is true." I repeat what I have said previously; that the decision on further increases towards the levels which the Board recommended, and which we think are the right levels, must await developments in the prices and incomes policy in the coming years.
My hon. Friend then asked, thirdly, when we would be discussing this matter with the House. I can only tell him that I hope to be able to do that before too long.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. Answers should be reasonably brief. Mr. Lubbock.

Mr. Lubbock: Is the right hon. Lady aware that the 2½ per cent. cumulative which she is giving to the chairmen of the nationalised industries is, as a proportion, much less than lower-paid workers would have received because of the high levels of taxation which the chairmen are already paying? Does she agree that it is virtually impossible to balance the harmful psychological effect that would come from giving too large an increase to these chairmen against the disincentive effect on those on somewhat lower salary levels by not allowing adequate head room? Since we have been extremely fortunate in obtaining for the nationalised industries people of high calibre, is the right hon. Lady aware of the need to pay them properly?

Mrs. Castle: I agree with the hon. Gentleman that the boards of these industries have been running into severe difficulties because of the lack of headroom for the drawing up of proper salary structures for those at below board level.

This fact must be faced because it is in the national interest, as well as in the interest of those of us who believe in public ownership, that we tackle this problem. Even this increase, on 1st April—which, graduated though it is, looks large—will, for the chairmen, mean an increase in take-home pay of £400 a year.

Mr. Higgins: The right hon. Lady's reply to my hon. Friend the Member for Worcestershire, South (Sir G. Nabarro) has completely confused the position. She said that the Government accept the Report. Is it or is it not the case that on 1st April stage 1 of the increase as set out on page 28 of the Report will or will not be implemented?

Mrs. Castle: I have made it clear that stage 1 will be implemented on 1st April, and stage 1 represents an overall annual increase of 2½ per cent. since the last percentage increase.

Mr. Shinwell: Will not the chairmen of the nationalised boards be immensely relieved to learn that they are not to receive £7,500 a year increases, because they are always telling us that it is all absorbed in taxation? For example, Lord Robens said that it only meant a few bob a week to him. In these circumstances, why should we worry about it? Is not the proposition of my right hon. Friend quite satisfactory in the circumstances? But would she now consider, in view of these payments made to those in the top drawer, that she should be a little more resilient about people on the lower level? For example, I.C.I. decided recently to award something like 6 per cent. to 40,000 employees, and it looks as if this is suspended in mid-air. Will my right hon. Friend be a little more resilient about those on the lower level?

Mrs. Castle: My right hon. Friend is quite right is saying that the take-home pay is very much lower than the gross figure. This is one of the problems we have presentationally in this field. In regard to the second part of my right hon. Friend's question, half the time I am admonished and told to be more flexible and in the other half I am reproved for trying to drive a coach-and-horses through the incomes policy. The House is very difficult to please in this matter. I can assure my right hon. Friend that we apply the principles of the prices and incomes


policy to all those settlements or claims noified to us as fairly as we can under the rules and at the same time imaginatively and with flexibility.

Mr. Biffen: Can the right hon. Lady say whether she accepts the recommendation of paragraph 87 of the Board's Report, which suggests that there should be no increase in the pay of top people in the Steel Corporation until stage 3 is realised as intended in paragraph 94?

Mrs. Castle: The Steel Corporation point is a separate one, as the Board itself has pointed out.

Mr. Sheldon: Is my right hon. Friend aware that she has accepted half the increase recommended for stage 1 for chairmen and deputy chairmen but the whole of the increase for members of boards? Will she say why she did that?

Mrs. Castle: No. I have accepted the whole of the increase for stage 1 for chairmen, deputy chairmen and board members. I have repeated this several times. I have pointed out that this is within the ceiling as an overall increase because they have not had an increase since 1964. The permitted average increase in these cases would be 17½ per cent., but the average increase they are granted is 12½ per cent.

Mr. Edward M. Taylor: Does the right hon. Lady realise that her decision will probably remove some of the absurd anomalies whereby recently-appointed members of the Railways Board have more money than the chairman, but does she realise that for stages 2 and 3 to come into force if her norm continues might take many years?

Mrs. Castle: I am not sure whether the anomaly will be removed even so. I have not the figures with me. I am aware of the anomaly to which the hon. Member has referred, and that is not the only case. I repeat that we shall have to review the further stages in the light of the developments of prices and incomes policy.

Mr. Heffer: Does my right hon. Friend agree that it is a totally "phoney" argument to suggest that differentials of 6d. or 1s. an hour for a supervisor in a factory or on a building site are in any way comparable with the sort of salaries

mentioned for top people in this document? Secondly, can she clarify this position, because stage 1, I understand, means that the deputy chairman will get 20 per cent.? Is she saying that a deputy chairman will not get 20 per cent. but merely 12½ per cent.? Can we get this very important point clear, because it is vital even in relation to her own prices and incomes policy which I believe is made a "dead duck" as a result of this decision?

Mrs. Castle: I want to make clear that the figures suggested in the Board's Report for stage 1 are being accepted. It is true that for the chairmen and deputy chairmen in some cases it will mean a 20 per cent. rise—[HON. MEMBERS: "Oh."] Certainly, but there is a far greater number of board members for whom the increase is only 10 per cent. One must average it out over the group, as is often done in other cases. I do not know whether my hon. Friend is about to protest that I have not given the board members enough. He cannot have it both ways. The simple fact is that it averages out over the group at 12½ per cent.

Several Hon. Members: rose—

Mr. Speaker: Order. I must protect the business of the House. It begins with a debate on this very subject. May I remind the opener of the first debate that the first debate will end at 1.15 p.m.?

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

Mr. Stephen Hastings and Sir Ian Orr-Ewing discharged from the Select Committee on Science and Technology; Mr. Michael Jopling and Mr. Patrick McNair-Wilson added.—[Mr. Fitch.]

Motion made, and Question proposed, That this House do now adjourn.—[Mr. Fitch.]

PRICES AND INCOMES BOARD'S REPORT (TOP SALARIES)

12.26 p.m.

Mr. William Hamilton: It is very appropriate that the first debate on the Easter Adjournment should be on the subject on which my right hon. Friend has made her statement.


Having listened to it, I wonder why the National Board for Prices and Incomes under Aubrey Jones investigated this problem at all. I hope that when the Cabinet met this morning it came to a unanimous decision on the statement my right hon. Friend has just made.
I would be the last in this House to pretend that this is a problem easy to solve. It is not, and the statement my right hon. Friend has just made has made very little contribution to its solution. It is significant that the origin of the reference of this problem to the Board began with a row which blew up in the House of Commons over an increase of pay of £100 a week to Mr. Jocelyn Hambro. I believe it was a supplementary question that was answered by the Under-Secretary off the cuff that set in train the investigation, the Report on which was published a week or two ago. The reference was made on 2nd July, 1968.

The Under-Secretary of State for Employment and Productivity (Mr. Harold Walker): I am sorry to interrupt my hon. Friend but I want him to understand clearly at the outset of this debate that the reply to which he has referred which I gave in July last year in reference to Mr. Hambro was not made off the cuff. It arose from a main Question and my main Answer. It was a carefully prepared, deliberate Answer.

Mr. Hamilton: I have a very strong recollection that my hon. Friend informed some of us that he was hauled over the coals a little for what he said on that occasion, but we will leave that matter there.
My right hon. Friend the Secretary of State fortified herself today, as she did at our party meeting last week, with quotations from the Select Committee on Nationalised Industries' Report, paragraph 308 and subsequent paragraphs. The membership of that Committee is, and was, a highly respected and authoritative cross-section of the House of Commons. My hon. Friend the Member for Poplar (Mr. Mikardo) was the Chairman and on the Committee were my hon. Friends the Members for Feltham (Mr. Russell Kerr) and Oldbury and Halesowen (Mr. Horner), who one might say are on the Left fringe of the Labour Party, and on the

outside Right of the Tory Party, the hon. Members for Walsall, South (Sir H. d'Avigdor-Goldsmid), Cirencester and Tewkesbury (Mr. Ridley), Barkston Ash (Mr. Alison) and the hon. and gallant Member for South Fylde (Colonel Lancaster). One could scarcely find a more respectable bunch than that and no one could dismiss lightly a unanimous Report signed by Members of that calibre.
Of course it may plausibly be argued that the present great disparities between the salaries paid to top people in the public and private sectors respectively militate against the kind of efficiency that we all want in the nationalised industries. The argument adduced by the Prices and Incomes Board was simply that, because the salary ceiling in the nationalised industries was too low, the incentives below that level were not and are not sufficient to create a satisfactory career structure and to give incentives to employees below that level to seek promotion and added responsibilities.
Evidence was given to the Nationalised Industries Sub-Committee by Sir Stanley Raymond and others on this matter in general terms—clearly, no names were mentioned. I recall that the then Minister of Power, now the Minister of Transport, gave evidence to the effect that it was difficult to find men of sufficient calibre to man the boards. The House will recall that when he was Minister of Power my right hon. Friend appointed Mr. Cecil King as a part-time member of the Coal Board, and one cannot be driven to greater depths of despair than that.
This clearly poses a considerable problem. On the other hand, referring to the difficulties in the nationalised industries the Chief Secretary to the Treasury in his evidence said:
I am answering in the context of the Minister who recently made a speech in the House of Commons and was interrupted by one of his backbenchers, this backbencher being very keen on wages policy and anxious that dividend policy should march hand in hand with wages policy. I would not expect that any such Member—and there must be many such—would welcome at the present time an increase in salary"—
an increase in salary, not 2½ per cent., or 3 per cent., or anything else—
of those who are getting £250–£500 a week within the terms of a wages policy.


I repeat, there may be much logic in the Report of the Prices and Incomes Board but, as often happens, what appears to be defensible in logic may not necessarily be acceptable in political terms.
For instance, the Lawrence Committee on Ministerial and M.P.s' salaries recommended that senior Ministers should get £14,000, on the ground that there had not been an increase in their salaries, not since 1944, but since 1831. Her Majesty's Government at that time decided, even though it could be logically argued that Ministers were entitled to the full increase suggested, to give themselves half the recommended increase. They took that decision because they knew that if they accepted the full increase recommended by the Lawrence Committee, there would be a political backlash which they chose to avoid.
Despite what my right hon. Friend has said today, she has sought to get the best of both worlds and, in a sense, she has got the worst of both. She has offended many people, both in the House and, no doubt, Lord Robens and others outside, who were expecting their £7,500. Within the context of the policy, the recommendations of the Aubrey Jones Report will be seen as a top brass charter and Aubrey Jones will be looked upon by Lord Melchett, Lord Robens and Sir Paul Chambers as their very own most militant and successful shop steward, far more successful than anybody at Fords or anywhere else.
Although my right hon. Friend is not implementing the Report fully, its recommendations and, I suspect, the recommendations made by my right hon. Friend will make no contribution to the evaluation of a new salary structure for any industry, private or public. The salaries of the chairmen and members of the boards of nationalised industries will still be far below those offered in private industry, and none of those salaries relates to productivity, job evaluation, working hours or anything of that kind, although those things are meticulously examined in detail when assessing the claims of nurses, bank clerks, farm workers and others in the low income groups.
I recommend my right hon. Friend to have a look at a report, published last year by Social Research Development Ltd., on the work and remuneration of

directors. It concluded that the remuneration of chairmen and directors, primarily those in private industry, was increasing appreciably and more than adequately. It said:
It seems difficult to see how they can be either underpaid or lacking incentive, even after taxation, seeing that their incomes today are much larger than they were then."—
referring to 1963.
Salaries in the nationalised sector and those in the private sector to a much greater extent tell much less than the whole story. The report of Social Research Development Ltd. listed 12 different types of fringe benefits—medical insurance, family allowances provided by employers, accident insurance, pensions, including top-hat benefits, share options and the like. It estimated that those fringe benefits could amount to £2,000 per annum for someone on a basic salary of £7,000, and that £2,000 additional did not include some of the larger items.
The Prices and Incomes Board's Report estimates the annual cost of providing fringe benefits at £187 a year in the private sector and £64 a year in the nationalised industries, but that is a lot of rubbish and nobody believes it. One has only to recall the example of Sir Bernard Docker some years ago. I quote Anthony Bambridge in The Observer of last Sunday when talking of the ex-chairman of an electrical company who was reckoned to hold the record and who enjoyed a mile of trout fishing, 100 acres of shooting, a country house, a flat in town and three company cars. That article went on:
For most managers fringe benefits are modest—a company car, a modicum of free booze, and expenses that the Revenue watches like a hawk.
It does not watch as much like a hawk as some of us should like.
I quote from the Labour Party's "Economic Brief". I presume that my right hon. Friend had some influence in drafting this. This is the brief which was handed out to us—for public speeches, presumably—dated November, 1968. It speaks about these very inquiries which were then under investigation—the Aubrey Jones one, and one by the Department—
into the pay of administration and executive staff in 30,000 firms, covering more than 100,000 people.


It goes on to talk about fringe benefits and says:
It would mean also that the very substantial growth in fringe benefits in recent years—and the widening differentials between management and workers".
to which my hon. Friend the Member for Salford, West (Mr. Orme) referred in a supplementary question to my right hon. Friend the Secretary of State earlier—
to wich they have contributed—would be considered fully and fairly within the framework of the incomes policy.
Finally it would mean opening to the public eye and public debate the whole basis of a managerial payment and management-workers' pay differentials. At the moment the whole area abounds with vague unsubstantiated myths.
That was a propaganda sheet which was handed out by the Labour Party to party members.
When the prices and incomes policy was first introduced it was emphasised by Ministers time and time again that this was not a scientific thing at all: it was rough justice. This was the expression which was used. It has become increasingly clear—the impression has not been minimised by right hon. Friend's statement today—that the justice is very much rougher for some than for others.
There now seem to be at least three prices and incomes policies. There is one for the weak and defenceless—that is, those who will not strike, for one reason or another, like nurses. I am an unapologetic and unremitting defender of the rights of nurses. I think that they are probably the most exploited group in the country today. Only in the last week or so, under the dicta of the same Prices and Incomes Board, chaired by the same Aubrey Jones, those nurses are now paying for every meal they get in their hospitals. As a result of that, at the end of the year they will probably be getting less pay net than they were at the beginning. This compares very strangely with the salaries proposed for Lord Robens and company. Who would suggest that our nursing profession is less vital to the well-being of the nation as a whole and to the standard of living as a whole than the chairmen and board members of nationalised industries? This is the kind of dual standard that some of us will not tolerate any longer.
The second prices and incomes policy applies to those who, because of inadequacy of funds or for other reasons, cannot strike. Agricultural workers come within this category. It is very difficult for them to organise strikes. The police cannot.

Mr. Stanley Orme: Firemen.

Mr. Hamilton: All public servants and local government people generally are within this category.
Then there is the third group, whose withdrawal of labour the Government would view with indifference. I suppose the miners might almost come within this category now. This is probably one of the reason why we are not getting as many strikes in the mines as we used to have: the miners have probably made a shrewd assessment of the position and recognise that coal is not in as great demand now as it was. Bank clerks, too, I suppose would come into this category. The Government would not care a hoot if the bank clerks struck—not as much as they would if the dockers or the car workers struck. A very different approach to incomes policy is taken if the dockers or tally clerks threaten to strike from that which is taken if the bank clerks or N.A.L.G.O. or the National Union of Agricultural Workers or the Building Trade Workers Union threaten to strike.
Now we have another incomes policy for top executives. My right hon. Friend has not said that she rejects the Report. She simply said, "I want to get over this difficult Easter period and get through until the Summer Recess. Then we will have another prices and incomes policy, perhaps backed by further legislation". I warn my right hon. Friend that some of us who supported the legislation previously will not support any further legislation on this matter. My right hon. Friend has argued today that these proposals fall within the criteria of the National Board for Prices and Incomes. I do not believe it. I am sure that those among whom I move in West Fife will not believe it either. I shall not try to persuade them that they do.
Some arguments, I suppose—the same arguments that my right hon. Friend used—could be adduced for raising her own salary. She has not had an increase since 1964. I have not. Nobody in


the House has. The poor Members of the House of Lords have been on 4½ guineas a day for a long time.

Mr. John Mendelson: We want to keep them that way.

Mr. Hamilton: Why not refer them to Aubrey Jones? The practical realities are that lower-paid workers will not accept even what my right hon. Friend has suggested today. They will regard this document and the statement that she has made today as unjust, inequitable, and discriminating in favour of the "haves" against the "have-nots".
I again quote from the brief from which I quoted earlier. This is the Labour Party's own document:
Why, for example, should a man who had the luck to inherit a particular mental or intellectual skill be paid so much more than someone who did not? Why should a man doing the most menial kind of work often in the worst sort of working conditions need so much less financial incentive than a man in a highly responsible, and generally highly congenial job?
This is the problem that we are facing. People are increasingly questioning the gross inequalities in society today and the singularly unsuccessful attempts by the Government since 1964 to reduce them. On the contrary, there is evidence that the inequalities are widening rather than reducing. People have a right to expect our Government to provide the answers.
Contrary to what some newspapers say, those of us who oppose the implementation of these proposals do not do it out of envy. I envy nobody who is running a nationalised industry. I want as much as anybody to see these industries run as efficiently as private industry—in fact, more efficiently than private industry. I think that that is the case now. There is no evidence whatever that the nationalised industries are run any less efficiently today than the most efficient private industry. The productivity record of the nationalised coal industry, or the gas industry, or the electricity industry, proves that they can tear the pants off any private industry.

Mr. John Biffen: indicated dissent.

Mr. Hamilton: The hon. Gentleman should compare the productivity record

of the nationalised coal industry over the last four or five years with any private industry he cares to take. He will find that the coal industry's record compares very favourably. One of the reasons for this is that the motivation for serving in a nationalised industry may be different, and I think is different, from the motivation for serving at the top of a private concern. Lord Robens has said that. He has said, "I could get three times what I am now getting with the Coal Board". I would not like to pay Lord Robens three times what he is getting now. Maybe this is one of the reasons why we are in some of the difficulties we are, if private industry is prepared to pay Lord Robens three times what he is getting now. I have no reason to disbelieve Lord Robens. However, if he can get £40,000 outside, he must be enjoying the job he is doing in the nationalised industry. I think he is.
What I think would have been more acceptable than what my right hon. Friend suggested today would be, first of all, to improve the pension prospects of the chairmen of the nationalised industries—they compare very unfavourably with the private sector—and, secondly, to give help to the middle and upper executive ranges within the nationalised industries, although this might sometimes mean that their salaries would be higher than the salaries of the board chairmen. That is accepted now. It is accepted in the steel industry. Lord Melchett, the Chairman, gets £16,000 and the Deputy-chairman gets £20,000 to £24,000. The Minister of Power gets £9,000 or £10,000. He is Lord Roben's boss, and he is the boss of Lord Melchett; he is the boss of all these people in the fuel industries. Perhaps he will put in a claim to Aubrey Jones on the grounds of comparability.
There is nothing surprising or exceptional about that. My right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, West (Mr. C. Pannell) said at a party meeting last week that we either have the prices and incomes policy or we have this Report; we cannot have both. He is right. The only people who are accepting the principles of this Report are, first of all, the extreme Left and militant people in the Labour movement who see the acceptance of the Report as a breaking point in the prices and incomes policy, and hon. Members opposite who see a prospect of stirring up political unrest in our party.


Of course, they are quite right. We are all political animals here. They see the implementation of these proposals as grist to their political mills and they are quite right. They are entitled to do what they can.
But the Ministers have this Report on their hands. They asked a silly question; they got a silly answer, and they made a silly riposte. Now they are stewing in their own juice. Please do not let us look for any more trouble. We have enough without looking for it. We have got it on our hands now. The corridors of power for Ministers start on these benches, and the sooner they realise that the better. Their existence depends on us and on our support. I wish they would understand that a little more than they do. We should have far more concern for the lower-paid and for those people of whom I have spoken—the nurses, the bricklayers, the labourers and the lower grades of skilled workers—than we have for the kind of people on whom we are spending our time here. We should devote a great deal more effort between now and the election on seeking a more equitable distribution of national wealth. All that my right hon. Friend said today and all that Aubrey Jones said in his Report make absolutely no contribution whatever to that end.

Mr. Speaker: I must remind the House that this debate will end at 1.15 exactly. I must protect the other business. The Minister will rise just after 1 o'clock. Therefore, speeches must be very brief.

12.54 p.m.

Mr. John Page: I shall be very brief, Mr. Speaker.
The right hon. Lady the Secretary of State for Employment and Productivity had a difficult job to do today, but too many veils covered the meaning of what she was saying. They were having to be torn away. Nobody who listened carefully to her at the beginning of her speech could possibly have understood that what she meant was, "I am giving them stage 1 and we are going to look at the other stages in a year's time."
The hon. Member for Fife, West (Mr. William Hamilton) spoke of the importance of fringe benefits. Paragraph 24 of Chapter I of the National Board for Prices and Incomes Report, No. 107, states:

'Fringe benefits' were also measured and found not to be of major importance in either sector of the economy 
—in either the private or the public sector. Therefore, I suggest that that part of the hon. Member's equalitarian speech did not have any logical basis.
The reason that the right hon. Lady gave in her statement for accepting stage 1 was merely that those concerned had not had a rise for a long time. This was not the main reason given in the Report, nor, of course, is it one of the major criteria in the White Paper. The main reason given in the Report for stages 1, 2 and 3 was that there were to be major reorganisations of wage and salary structures which could be justified on productivity and efficiency grounds. Of course the right hon. Lady was right logically in accepting that there had to be an increase. Of course there had to be an increase. The previous Conservative Government showed courage in this respect when they offered a very high salary to get Lord Beeching in to run the railways, and all that he did while he had that job showed that he was worth it.
But, having said that, I do not believe that those who are employed in the nationalised industries resent the fact that the chairmen of the boards should get higher salaries. What they do resent is that their own salaries, freely negotiated between employer and employee, should be held down by the Government. It is the statutory aspect of the incomes policy which is really resented. It is resented by the bank clerks, the ambulance drivers and the dockers. It is this very fact that it is the say-so of the right hon. Lady by which the whole of their future increases will be measured.
The right hon. Lady should say that she will give stage 1 today. She should also say that, having given that, she realises that the statutory prices and incomes policy on which she is working is not worth the paper on which it is written. It has no more credence in the country. It is resented by every person employed in business and industry. It does not do its job and it should be scrapped immediately. That would make sense of her statement today.

12.58 p.m.

Mr. Charles Pannell: I understand that I have only two or three


minutes in which to speak, and I am conscious that there are Members who have other matters to raise.
There are certain things which are just not on in this life. They cannot be lined up according to logic, comparability or anything else. Take, for example, the question of Gibraltar. A statement can be made and it can be argued that Spain has a case, but this House would not accept it. Only time prevents me from giving other examples. What the right hon. Lady has done today is to remove a wedge from the log jam that is at present in the whole of professional life, particularly among the salaried employees. She has removed that, and certain consequences immediately follow.
The Permanent Secretaries will be first in the queue—make no mistake about that. Then there is the hierachy of the Civil Service. That will be followed immediately by comparability claims from the town clerks. Once we get the town clerk's claim the comparability of every other chief officer will come into the picture. The chief officers, administrators and consultants of the National Health Service will be next. One only has to remember 1964 and what happened when the Ministers decided to take only half of what the Lawrence Committee recommended. The judges asked for no less. Here, in parenthesis, to suggest that judges' responsibilities, with all their pensions at the end of the day, are comparable to a Cabinet Minister's responsibilities, is a trifle ridiculous. Of course, Mr. Speaker's comparability also is tied up with this, but I will not go into that because I would be out of order in doing so.
Now we have the nationalised industries. If we take the personalities at the head of the nationalised industries and how they got there—I am not speaking in a derogatory sense—they got into offices of great prestige, and all sorts of advantages follow because of the prestige of these offices when they leave them. They will not be disadvantaged. One could mention Members' salaries, too, and the time when there was a terrific outcry, after we had waited longer than five years, and it was said that, as a gesture, we should not get an increase in 1964.
Then we moved on to the prices and incomes policy. But the Minister has

herself often argued that craftsmen should give up some of their differentials to bring up the pay of women. I have as good a record on that as my right hon. Friend; I moved resolutions calling for equal pay in 1952, and I have always been associated with the movement. But I have never used that argument; I have taken it on balance of work and worth. Quite often, we hear an argument against craftsmen—of whom I could claim to be one once, though I should be pretty rusty now—that somehow our differentials should be given away for the lower-paid, although they are our incentives.
I say to my right hon. Friend, therefore, that she will create difficulties in the nationalised industries themselves. She will have no answer to all those people over the £3,000 and £4,000 mark who will want to be brought up into comparable relationship with their bosses. With the greatest good will, I suggest to my right hon. Friend that she has let something loose here. It is a good thing to consider the consequences of one's acts, but one should go on to consider the consequences of the consequences. That has not been done here. I can only say that among her most loyal colleagues she will make it more difficult to defend her prices and incomes policy. That is why I said that I thought that the timing of what she has done would have been far better when she could see the end of that legislation. It is in sorrow rather than in anger that I am speaking to her now.

1.2 p.m.

Mr. Terence L. Higgins: I am glad to have the opportunity to speak in this severely curtailed but none the less important debate, and I quite understand that I have only about two minutes in which to make my comments. It is right, therefore, that I should concentrate on the actual statement made to us this morning.
It is unfortunate, to say the least, that the Minister should phrase her statement to the House today in such a way as to give the impression that the increase being given is only 2½ per cent. and then to base her argument on the fact that the pay was effectively taking into account that there had not been an increase in a previous period. It is apparent from the Report of the Prices and Incomes Board


itself, paragraph 93 in particular—the hon. Member for Fife, West (Mr. William Hamilton) pointed this out—that some of the increases will amount to 20 per cent. This means that the Minister is bound to set off a series of pay claims, justified or not, which will endanger her policy, or, rather, aggravate even further the general chaos which is the result of her policy.
That being so, the Minister has the worst of both worlds. Even what she has done will not give the nationalised industries sufficient headroom to reorganise their structure in the way they ought to organise it, and, by accepting the Board's use of a major reorganisation as a loophole through which one can put in a wage claim, the right hon. Lady is opening the door to many other wage claims throughout industry. She has effectively enlarged the criteria far beyond the narrow criteria which have hitherto been applicable.
One final point. The Board itself in considering top salaries in industry points out on page 32
we cannot necessarily say whether the policy has been strictly adhered to.
The fact of the matter is that the Government still do not have, and are unlikely to produce, a wide survey of what is happening to salaries, and the result of the piecemeal policy which they are adopting is bound to be unfair because they simply do not have the data on which to found a comprehensive policy. I do not believe that a comprehensive policy is possible, but the overall effect will be to pursue a statutory policy, a policy which will inevitably be unfair and, I believe, against the economic interests of this country.

1.4 p.m.

The First Secretary of State and Secretary of State for Employment and Productivity (Mrs. Barbara Castle): The hon. Member for Worthing (Mr. Higgins) and my hon. Friend the Member for Fife, West (Mr. William Hamilton) both tried to argue that the Government had got the worst of both worlds. But that is a familiar criticism and one easy to make when a Government face conflicts of need—national need, social need and needs of equity—and try to find a way of avoiding grave injustices to either side. That is what we have done. What we have done, as, I believe, most of the

House would wish us to do, has been to face up to the real problems of management which are now developing in nationalised industries, recognising that the situation is really urgent, while at the same time doing it in recognition of the fact that in a period when we are calling for restraint all down the line we have to have regard, and ought to have regard, to the criteria of our own prices and incomes policy.
I realise that a good many of my hon. Friends do not like the policy. My hon. Friend the Member for Fife, West had a great deal of fun with it. But I make two comments in reply to him. First and foremost, when the salaries policy exists we ought surely to apply it as equitably as is humanly possible. Second, my hon. Friend has left us no clearer in this debate than in previous debates on what would be his alternative wages and salaries policy. That is the weakness of my hon. Friend's whole case, as it is, above all, the weakness of the Opposition's case. The Opposition continue their chanting about our wicked prices and incomes policy. But we have still to discuss and resolve in the House the basis on which equity and justice can be done in an age when differentials are bound to be paramount.
My hon. Friend said that I had presented a "top brass" charter. He is far too intelligent to believe that. He knows very well what the position is in nationalised industry. As the Board itself points out, these people have double the responsibilities for half the pay. We are not the pace-setters here, and we still shall not be, for we have deliberately kept them behind in order to challenge some of the assumptions on which top salaries are being paid today in the private sector. I draw to my hon. Friend's attention the consultations which I am having with the C.B.I. and the T.U.C. about the possibility of referring, as the Board suggests, salary structures in individual firms for examination.
Does my hon. Friend think that we introduced a "top brass" charter back in 1946 and 1947 when we nationalised coal and transport and set up the National Coal Boad and British Transport Commission, fixing the salaries for their chairmen then, at a time when there was no prices and incomes policy? Since then, average weekly earnings for men


have risen by 250 per cent. The salaries of the chairman of the boards have increased by only 50 per cent. from the figure which we fixed. We thought that those salaries were right in those days when the Labour Government created the boards. That is what we felt when in Government, having been elected on a great programme for the extension of public ownership. We fixed those salaries then, and we have allowed them systematically to fall behind. I do not believe that that is a Socialist way of doing things.
My right hon. Friend the Member for Leeds, West (Mr. C. Pannell) said that there were some things which were just not on in life and that what I had done was, as he put it, to remove a wedge from the log jam of professional salaries. He gibed at me, as others have done, for putting this over as I did, first making clear that we should apply the increase at 1st April and, second, bringing to the attention of the House what it means in terms of prices and incomes percentages. I was laughed at for doing that, but do not my hon. Friends realise that it is this containment of increases within the prices and incomes criteria that alone can help us to prevent the log jam from bursting, as my hon. Friend feared? One cannot have it both ways. It is because I believe that these are the criteria—and the Board's Reports have all helped us to discuss relativities in a meaningful way—that I think my hon. Friends are dismissing far too easily the advantages that have flowed from what is admittedly a difficult thing to operate, a prices and incomes policy.
I repeat that we accept the principles that the Board has outlined. As the hon. Member for Harrow, West (Mr. John Page) pointed out, one of the principles is that the increase is justified not merely by the lapse of time but on the grounds of productivity and efficiency, because it paves the way for a major restructuring of salaries under board level on principles which the Board points out should not be reward for length of service or seniority but for greater responsibility and performance.
I think that we have found the correct way to help to sustain the great Socialist instruments of the nationalised industries, while not doing violence to the principles of the prices and incomes policy. It is

for that reason that I am sure that the House, on reflection, will be satisfied that we have taken the right course.

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Harry Gourlay): Mr. Taylor.

Mr. William Hamilton: rose—

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I called Mr. Taylor.

1.12 p.m.

Mr. Edward M. Taylor: We have had an example of real Stone Age——

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I called Mr. Taylor. I must ask the hon. Member for Fife, West (Mr. William Hamilton) to resume his seat. I did not understand that he was intervening.

Mr. Taylor: In the three minutes left I want to say that while I deplore nationalisation as a principle, and deplore a prices and incomes policy, I think that it is distinctly encouraging, at a time when the Government seem to be falling to pieces, to have one Minister who seems to have some guts. I applaud the right hon. Lady for being prepared to make this very difficult decision, which is bound to cause her a great deal of embarrassment. A few months ago the hon. Member for Fife, West (Mr. William Hamilton) asked in a Question how many millions of pounds the nationalised industries had had written off their capital since the Government came to power. He was given an Answer which showed that it had been written off at the rate of £1 million a day. Is the hon. Gentleman now saying that we should not have men with a proper salary in charge of those industries? There are ludicrous anomalies. Members of the Railways Board are being paid more than their chairman, who I believe is trying his very best in a difficult situation. We have the ludicrous position of wages being utterly out of line. I have made it clear time and time again that I think a wages policy imposed by Government is nonsense, but so long as we have one, Mr. Gourlay——

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. We are in the House, not in Committee.

Mr. Taylor: I am sorry—Mr. Deputy Speaker.
So long as we have a wages policy it must be fair. Should not the increase in


the cost of living since the last increase in the wages of the chairmen be taken into account? Bearing in mind the millions of pounds we are pouring into nationalised industries, which I would want to stop, and the millions of pounds we are writing off their capital, which I do not like, I believe that it is in the national interest that we should get the best men to do the job. We should also remember the difficulty the Government are having in appointing people to many of the new boards, councils and commissions we are setting up.
I hope that we shall once and for all abandon the Stone Age Socialist nonsense we heard from the hon. Member for Fife, West today. I hope that the day will come when the nationalised industries are diminished and a Government prices and incomes policy is abolished. But as we approach a Recess with the Government falling to pieces, and Ministers abandoning ship, when we have one Minister prepared to stand up to her party and give it some of the facts of life, we should not go away without saying, "Well done."

Mr. Eric S. Heffer: rose—

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Sir John Gilmour.

Mr. Heffer: There was one minute left.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. I thought that the hon. Gentleman was rising on a point of order. I call the hon. Gentleman on a point or order.

Mr. Heffer: On a point of order. There was one minute left in the debate. What I wanted to say could have been said very clearly in one minute.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. There is no specific timetable in a debate of this kind.

Mr. Heffer: Further to that point of order. We were told by Mr. Speaker that there was a specific timetable and that the debate on the Prices and Incomes Board Report would end by 1.15 p.m. sharp.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. There is a time set out on the list in the Lobby as a guide to the Chair and the Members participating in the debate, but no Guillotine or sharp time is proposed. I called

the hon. Member for Fife, East (Sir J. Gilmour) because it was approximately 1.15, as I saw the clock.

Mr. John Page: Further to that point of order. The beginning of the debate was held up for some time. As we lost half an hour at the beginning, it might be fair to give other hon. Members from both sides an opportunity to take part, as I did.

Mr. Deputy Speaker: Order. The time allocated for the debate took into account circumstances which might arise after Question Time.

AGRICULTURAL BUILDINGS, SCOTLAND (RATING)

1.16 p.m.

Sir John Gilmour: In a reply to a supplementary question which I put on 12th March to the Under-Secretary of State for Scotland who answers for agricultural matters, I was told that rates paid on farm buildings are taken into account in Price Review discussions. He had said in his original Answer to me that about 2 per cent. of farms in Scotland had some rated buildings on them. The Minister also said in reply to a supplementary question by my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, West (Mr. Stodart) that Scotland had a higher proportion of rated farm buildings than did the rest of the country.
This is borne out by two further Parliamentary Answers to my hon. Friend the Member for North Angus and Mearns (Mr. Buchanan-Smith), in which the Secretary of State for Scotland gave the figure for rates paid on agricultural building in Scotland as £133,000, compared with £250,000 in England.
That is a difference of only £100,000, whereas one would have expected the English figure to be eight to 10 times larger, in view of the difference in the size of Scotland and England. It means that if rates are being paid in respect of only about 2 per cent. of holdings in Scotland the proportion of people paying rates in England must be very much less.
I know from many of my hon. Friends that there is extreme disquiet not only in Scotland but in England about the rating of agricultural buildings. The


whole agricultural community is worried about paying rates on agricultural buildings, but it is obvious that a very unfair rate burden is falling on Scottish farmers. There is every indication that the situation will get worse, not better.
In many ways, I may be doing a disservice to a certain extent by raising this matter in debate, but as more assessors get round to their revaluations and look at the changes taking place in the structure of agricultural buildings, the likelihood is that the number of buildings in respect of which rates are paid will increase. With changes in agricultural circumstances, the use of intensive livestock housing is increasing. The squeeze on their profits reinforces the farmers' need to get the maximum number of animals congregated so that they can be looked after by the smallest number of people. That must be so if a living is to be made and if we are to compete efficiently. As it is, these charges are bound to aggravate an already quite serious situation.
The Under-Secretary of State for Scotland may know that in the Lothians one intensive livestock unit for the housing of cattle has already had to go out of production because it was felt not possible to make a profit when this high burden of rates was being put on buildings.
The effect of rates on the cost of production can be quite considerable, and a pig farmer living not very far from me has sent me an example. He writes that he recently appealed to the Tribunal against a gross annual value of £4,000 put on his pig enterprise. He has lost the appeal. In the calendar year 1968, this farm produced 2,881 bacon pigs at an average live weight of 200 lbs.; 1,517 porkers at an average weight of 120 lb., and 4,346 weaners at an average live weight of 45 lb. That is a total production of 953,810 lb. of pig.
A sum of £4,000, the gross annual value, is 96,000 pennies. For all intents and purposes, therefore, the rate per lb. of live weight sale is 1d. Related to the effect on the production of the pigs, it means that the rate value against the bacon pig is 16s. 8d.; against the porker, 10s., and against the weaner 3s. 9d. I admit that these figures are gross annual value and that on net annual value the

figures might be rather lower, but there cannot be very much in it.
The Minister of Agriculture has recently provided an incentive to increase the pig herd, but it seems obvious that the increased price given to the pig producer will be more than swallowed up in rates. The Minister has said that this fact is taken into account in the Price Review, but it is obvious that the benefit cannot be distributed fairly over the country as a whole. The proportion of rates paid in England is very much lower. It is the progressive and efficient farmer, who is spending money, who will bear the burden of the rates, and that is particularly unfair.
Test cases have shown that, with very few minor exceptions, all holdings in Scotland which have intensive livestock units are likely to be charged with rates. We are at present operating under a rating Act passed in 1956, but because of developments in agriculture since then, the approach intended when that Act was passed cannot now be applied. If we are to get that expansion in agriculture which all parties believe necessary in order to save imports, one of the chief ways of getting it is to increase the amount of pig meat, particularly bacon, that we ourselves produce.
In that connection, the N.E.D.C. report on pig expansion over the next five years suggests that we should have about 270,000 additional breeding sows. Scotland would probably get about 30,000 of them. The Pig Industry Development Association has estimated that the total cost of providing the necessary housing for those extra sows is £33½ million, plus £27 million for the housing of the pigs that are taken on to fatten for bacon.
A total of £60½ million, therefore, has to be envisaged for the pig industry alone if we are to achieve the import saving which the N.E.D.C. believes is right. I estimate that Scotland's share would be about £10 million. If the industry, with all its difficulties—the present high rates of interest, and so on—is to be asked to find such an amount and has to pay rates in addition, will that expansion ever take place? I do not think that it will.
The additional food required for that extra pig production over those five years is estimated at about 2 million tons. About 1½ million tons would consist of


home-grown cereals, and Scotland would have its share. It is in terms like that that the Minister of Agriculture has spoken on incentives for the expansion of cereal growing. It therefore seems certain that the development which we need in the pig industry, and which is likely to take place in other spheres of agriculture, will not take place while we have the present rating law in Scotland.
There are very many developments in the housing of livestock. Only today I read an article in the Financial Times on developments in the housing of sheep. It pointed out that in the Continent of Europe a great many flocks of sheep are housed, but what incentive is there to use these latest livestock housing techniques if those adopting them are to be penalised by having to pay rates on their buildings? This rating charge will always be a brake on the extension of the farming industry. It will stop people from using the most efficient methods of developing the livestock industries in a competitive world in a way which will give the farmers a profit.
One of the greatest drawbacks about the present rating situation is the unfair way in which it reacts on different farmers——

Mr. Deputy Speaker (Mr. Harry Gourlay): Order. The hon. Gentleman must not, in an Adjournment debate, suggest any alteration in the present legislation.

Sir J. Gilmour: If the present legislation was crystal clear, all might be well. As it is, members of the farming community are having to take many cases to court in order to find out what the law really is. One of the troubles is that the law was based on the Sorn Report, which did not envisage any special change in the law of rating in Scotland.
Somehow or other, since that time, the interpretation of the law by the courts has led to a change in the type and the way in which rates are levied on buildings in Scotland. While I do not suggest that the only way in which this can be remedied is by a change in the law, it is fair to point out that the law appears to be in doubt. I want to draw this to the Minister's attention, because it is only in this way that the difficulties of the agricultural industry can be resolved.
It cannot be fair to have one set of people paying rates, and another set not doing so. It cannot be fair to have a universal price system for the industry in the United Kingdom, so that the price for barley, fat cattle, pigs and poultry is the same in an Annual Price Review, while the cost factors that make this up are different in different parts of the country. I hope that the Minister fully realises the seriousness of this situation for the agricultural community, and that the consultations which I know have been going on will very soon come to a swift conclusion, so that there is absolutely no doubt, and people can go ahead with plans for agricultural expansion without the fear of an unfair burden of rates being levied upon them.

1.32 p.m.

Mr. Ian MacArthur: The House will be grateful to my hon. Friend the Member for Fife, East (Sir J. Gilmour) for raising a matter which has been, and is, a source of extreme disquiet among farmers, particularly in Scotland. My hon. Friend referred to the scale of this disquiet and I should like to confirm what he said from my own experience. Every group of farmers I meet inevitably raises this question and expresses its uncertainty about the future course of rating. Farmers emphasise to me the need for a clear Government decision about what should now happen.
My hon. Friend reminded the House that a very high proportion of this growing rate burden falls on Scotland. We were assured that these costs would be taken into account in the Annual Price Review. I hope that the Minister will tell us how these increased costs were taken into account at the last Review and what adjustments were made, in Scottish terms, to take note of the growing burden which has fallen on Scottish farmers.
We are told, from time to time, that this development or that which has increased farming costs—and goodness me, we have had a stream of governmental decisions over the last few years which have had added heavily to the financial burden on farmers—will be taken into account at the forthcoming Price Review. I doubt whether farmers are any longer impressed by these alleged assurances. Any credibility that the Government


might have retained was finally completely shattered by the last Price Review statement, particularly when the terms of that statement were compared with the assurances given to the House and the industry last November by the Minister of Agriculture.
The development of intensive methods in farming reflects the constant search for greater efficiency. Yet the position today is that, as these intensive methods are developed, so they attract a growing rate burden which is a disincentive to further development and to the growing efficiency for which we are looking. My hon. Friend explained the problem clearly. What he and the industry are looking for is a clear declaration today of the Government's intentions. In correspondence which I have had with the Under-Secretary of State, I have learned that the Government are considering the problem. They have been considering the problem for years, and the industry expects not a declaration about further consideration but a declaration about a definite decision. It is not a declaration we want so much as a clear decision about the way in which this growing problem can be resolved. The industry is awaiting this decision with rising impatience. I hope that the hon. Gentleman will be able to make a clear and definitive statement this afternoon.

1.37 p.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for Scotland (Mr. Bruce Millan): May I preface my remarks by apologising for the fact that my hon. Friend the Joint Under-Secretary of State, the Member for Renfrew, West (Mr. Buchan) who normally deals with agricultural matters is unavoidably absent today. I am answering in his stead.

Mr. MacArthur: May I thank the hon. Gentleman for his courtesy, and may I also express the apologies of my hon. Friend the Member for Edinburgh, West (Mr. Stodart), who would normally deal with such matters but who is unable to be present.

Mr. Millan: I think that both of us are acting in rather unaccustomed capacities today.
I listened with considerable interest to what was said about this by the hon.

Member for Perth and East Perthshire (Mr. MacArthur), because I take his point that it is a matter causing the farming community in Scotland, particularly those directly concerned, considerable concern. That is also true South of the Border. On 30th January this year there was a meeting at which both farmers unions were represented, with the agricultural Ministers of Scotland and England. The hon. Member for Fife, East (Sir J. Gilmour) has made a very fair statement of the position and I accept a number of things that he said. I know that Scottish agriculture is proportionately carrying a higher rate burden in this respect than that carried by farmers in England and Wales.
I also take the point—although I shall have something to say about the total burden later—that in particular cases the rate burden can be a very substantial expense upon an individual business. I accept that those who are engaged in intensive methods and who have now attracted a rating burden feel that they are being penalised unfairly in comparison with agricultural producers using non-intensive methods and paying no rates.
I would not accept as completely proved the proposition that the producers in the intensive areas should necessarily be placed on all fours with the producers using non-intensive methods. That is one of the basic issues involved in this controversy. Obviously a sense of unfairness must persist among those using intensive methods. A considerable amount of attention has been given to this issue, and my right hon. Friend is very well aware of the considerations which the hon. Gentleman brought to our attention.

Sir J. Gilmour: As I understand it, under the present law, one may have a building used for intensive purposes, which is rated, and one may have other buildings used for part of the year for the intensive rearing of livestock and then used as a farm store for another part of the year, and these do not appear to attract rates. This seems to be a further anomaly.

Mr. Millan: The hon. Gentleman is only illustrating the extreme complexity of this subject. Perhaps I might return to that later.
One of the difficulties facing everyone is that the exact state of the law is becoming clarified only because of a number of decisions in individual cases. This has been a difficulty facing the Government as well as the farmers. My right hon. Friend appreciates the issues involved. We have had consultations with the National Farmers' Union and recently with the Scottish Landowners' Federation. Although it is fair to say that the hon. Gentleman has restated the position rather than introduced any new material, we shall take account of what he said.
When dealing with rating matters it is necessary to have some regard to the rating system as a whole and the fact that it is a very complex structure. It is not for me today to deal with the rating system as a whole, but I should make the point that many interests other than agricultural interests feel that they should have an additional measure of relief from rates. Private occupiers and commercial interests, perhaps especially in Scotland, feel that their burden is severe. Industrial interests have views about the incidence of rates. The interests of local authorities as a whole must be taken into account.
I do not suggest that we must necessarily have regard to the whole field of rating or that we must take everybody's interest into consideration before making any adjustment affecting one particular interest, but the background is complex and it is perhaps made rather more complex by the fact that a Royal Commission on Local Government is sitting and we have committed ourselves to considering the question of local authority finance as a whole when it has reported. However, I am not saying that nothing can or must be done about this problem until we have sorted out all the other issues. I merely say that we are dealing with a particularly complex matter.
I accept that for the individual producer the impact of rates may be serious, but we should try to get the costs involved in perspective. The figure is approaching £200,000. That is slightly higher than the figure quoted by the hon. Member for Fife, East. The figure is probably not more than about one-tenth of 1 per cent. of the total expenses of Scottish farms. We are, therefore, dealing with a problem which, in that relationship, is comparatively minor,

although I do not underestimate the problems which it may pose for individuals. The number of holdings concerned in Scotland is about 750, or less than 2 per cent. of the total number of agricultural holdings. Therefore, the problem is confined to a comparatively narrow area.
However, there is an uneven incidence in rates, and more and more holdings are being brought into the rating field. In Scotland the picture is by no means even. Nevertheless, in our experience over the last two or three years, there is no foundation for some of the fears which the hon. Member for Fife, East expressed. He specifically mentioned the problem of pig producers. In the last two years, the rate of expansion in Scotland in this respect has been greater than in the United Kingdom as a whole. Since 1966, when the figures were admittedly low, there has been a very considerable expansion. In 1966, the total number of pigs was 491,000. In 1968, it was 592,000. Most of the increase would be largely in the intensive sector. Therefore, considerable development has been taking place, despite the fears which the hon. Gentleman mentioned.
The total burden of rates on the industry is taken into account in the Annual Price Review. The hon. Member for Perth and East Perthshire asked for an assurance on this point. The item for rents and interest in Appendix III of the White Paper which has just been published includes the rates burden. I assure the hon. Gentleman that the additional costs for the year covered by the latest Review, which amounted to about £40,000 in Scotland, were included under the heading in Appendix III. The figures were based on returns of rateable values supplied by the assessors.
Perhaps rather more than half of the rateable buildings are used for broiler production and hatcheries. They are not covered in the Review since they are not Review commodities. On the other hand, the returns which are attributable to Review commodities—for example, pigs and eggs—are taken into account in calculating the costs of the industry for the purpose of the Review. Therefore, the industry as a whole derives some benefit. If the hon. Gentleman looks at the Appendix which I have mentioned and compares the total cost increases for


all products with the amount taken into account for the Review products, he will see that the sum in respect of the Review products proportionately is not ungenerous. I accept that the Review system is not able to even out differences between one producer and another. Nevertheless, I can give the assurance that the total amount of costs is taken into account in the Review.

Sir J. Gilmour: Does not that mean that, as the proportion of people who pay rates in Scotland is higher, that acts to the benefit of all English farmers?

Mr. Millan: Probably it is true, with regard to a number of cost items which are taken into account in the Review, that one is not able to get an absolute equivalence of benefit between England and Scotland. This is intrinsic to the Review procedure. The total costs are certainly taken into account in the Review.
I wish to make a point about the delay in reaching a decision. I recognise that there is a certain amount of validity in this argument. Nevertheless, it would be unfair to the Government to suggest that there has been a considerable delay when one considers the inherent complexity of the issue and the fact that the law has been defined gradually by a series of cases over the years. The Valuation and Rating (Scotland) Act, 1956, provides for the de-rating of agricultural land, including agricultural buildings used solely in connection with agricultural operations. The first case which raised difficulties was in 1963, but there was need then, as much from the farming interests' point of view as from the Government's point of view, to wait for a pattern to be established by court decisions. This has meant that in many cases we have had to await the results of appeals. That has been true in England as well as Scotland. However, the N.F.U. has now presented its case which is being actively considered.
I hope that hon. Members will not be too disappointed if I conclude by saying that I am not able to announce a decision or even an indication of the decision that the Government are likely to reach. Nor am I able to say precisely when an announcement will be made. We appreciate the uncertainty in the industry over the present position. The Government

are committed to reaching a decision on this very tricky matter as soon as they possibly can. I think that the debate will go a little way towards enabling us to reach that decision.

Sir J. Gilmour: I should like the Minister to bear in mind one other point. Rating does and will have a big effect on the co-operative movement between farmers. There is a real need to encourage co-operation. Whilst it is difficult to keep within the rules of order in stressing this point, I should like to be certain that, when making up their minds about it, the Government will bear in mind that there is a need to look after the furthering of the co-operative movement between farmers.

Mr. Millan: That point also will be borne in mind. I will certainly draw it to my right hon. Friend's attention.

EAST STREET, SOUTH STIFFORD (EXPLOSION)

1.51 p.m.

Mr. Hugh Delargy: On Monday morning, 16th September, 1968 an explosion occurred in 46 East Street, South Stifford, West Thurrock. Why the attention of this House should be brought to this occurrence, and why now and not sooner, will become apparent during the debate.
The explosion occurred immediately after Thurrock had had the heaviest rainfall that this country has ever known. More than eight inches of rain was recorded in the previous 48 hours. Steps were at once taken to find out the cause of the explosion and whether there was danger of another explosion, or even of others. The North Thames Gas Board checked the gas supply system and found no leak. Gas, electricity and water supplies were cut off in East Street and in two neighbouring streets. These services were not restored until after each property had been thoroughly tested and declared safe. They were all cleared by midnight on Tuesday, 17th September.
The next day, 18th September—two days after the explosion—Thurrock Council contacted the Royal Society of Chemists and asked for advice on the appointment of an expert consultant chemist to investigate the cause of the


explosion and to recommend what steps ought to be taken to prevent a recurrence. As a result of the Society's recommendation, the services of Dr. M. Barent were engaged.
Dr. Barent's investigation turned out to be long and arduous. He was not able to report to the Thurrock Urban District Council until the end of January. He discovered that in the area there had been three immense spillages of petroleum. In this area—and I will refer to this later—there are very large oil installations. Dr. Barent discovered that there had been a spillage of 370 tons in July, 1966, 40 tons in October, 1966, and 37 tons in August, 1968, just a short time before the floods and the explosion.
Having taken everything into consideration, Dr. Barent formed the opinion that
the explosion at No. 46 East Street was caused by the ignition of an explosive mixture of petrol vapour and air, and that this petrol vapour was derived wholly or mainly from the spillage in July 1966.
That was the large spillage of 370 tons.
He also took the view that
the exceptional rainfall was responsible for raising petrol vapour that had accumulated below the house and expressing it into the ground floor, where it was able to gain access because there was no impermeable barrier to impede its transfer from the ground to the house.
He then made his recommendations about what should be done to remedy this situation and to prevent further explosions.
I am aware that the Government know all about this—at least the two Government Departments concerned, the Home Office and the Ministry of Power, which operate respectively the two Acts of Parliament which deal with the storage of petrol and with the construction and operation of pipelines: the Petroleum Act, 1928, and the Pipelines Act, 1962.
These two Departments know all about it because they have Dr. Barent's report. But, even before that, the Chief Inspector of Explosives, Home Office, and the Pipelines Inspector, Ministry of Power, had been in constant consultation with the Thurrock Council.
Why raise the matter now? There are several reasons. First, within the urban district of Thurrock, with its 18 miles of Thames-side frontage, lies the largest concentration of oil installations in the

United Kingdom—the largest, indeed, in North-West Europe. It is a major risk area.
We in Thurrock are concerned about the safety and, indeed, the comfort and the peace of mind of the people who live near these installations. We are also concerned about deficiencies in the present legislation to prevent further accidents or, if they occur, to deal with the situation afterwards.
We feel that the Government have not shown sufficient active interest at South Stifford. In everything that has happened as a result of this explosion—investigations, experiments and measures taken afterwards—the Government have been conspicuous by their absence and by their silence. There may be reasons for this, but we should like to know them.
Everything had to be initiated, co-ordinated and carried out by the Thurrock Urban District Council. The researches of Dr. Barent and the Council's petroleum officers, consultations with senior civil servants, participation of the Essex River Authority, sewage authorities, other authorities and petroleum companies were left to Thurrock Council. Thurrock Council did it all splendidly, but we think that the Government should have actively participated. We think that there should have been an official Government inquiry.
Even in his correspondence with me, my hon. Friend seems blandly unaware of any Government responsibility. He, too, refers everything to the council. He says:
The Council are at present exploring different methods. … Work will be put in hand as soon as the Council have decided which method will be best… It is entirely for the Council to decide what action, if any, should be taken against the company in respect of the spillage.
And so on. Everything is referred back to the council.
It is the opinion of the council—and my opinion, too—that the laws governing the storage of oil and the construction and operation of pipelines need amending and extending. I know that it would be out of Order in an Adjournment debate for me to ask for new legislation, but I draw the attention of the House to a document which has been sent from Thurrock Council to my hon. Friend at the Home Office and to the Ministry of


Power commenting on the existing laws, pointing out how they were deficient in South Stifford and how they ought to be changed. It is an admirable document of 33 paragraphs. I hope that it will be carefully studied and the opinions on it made known by the two Ministeries. Strictly speaking we ought to have two Ministers here this morning, because two Ministers are responsible for this matter, but I have no doubt that my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State has been in touch with the Ministry of Power on this subject which concerns them both.
It is not in order to ask for new legislation today, but it is in order to comment on the present law. Under the existing legislation the Government can impose different requirements for different areas; in other words, they can demand special requirements for areas of greater hazard. They can insist that additional valves be installed so that sections of the line can be isolated in case of leakage, spillage, or any other accident. Under the present Acts the Government have the power, and we believe the duty, to consult local fire authorities. We want to know what consideration has been given to this area where the hazards are obvious, where there are larger oil installations than almost anywhere else in Europe. We want to know whether additional valves have been installed as provided for by Act of Parliament. We want to know what consultation has taken place between the Government Departments concerned and the fire authority, and indeed with any other authority.
There are many other things that we want to know. We want to know, for example, why penalties for contravening the Acts are so ludicrously small. It appears that no legal action can be taken by the Minister of Power in respect of spillages themselves. This apparently is not a fault. The only fault is failure to notify the appropriate authorities of any spillage, and even then the penalty for failure to notify is a paltry £50. We believe that the penalties should be greatly increased.
Those are some of the reasons why we still want a Government inquiry. It is no good the Government saying that there has been sufficient inquiry. No inquiry has been made into the matters

which I have raised. The Barent inquiry was not meant to cover those matters. It was set up exclusively to consider the causes of the explosion and the measures to be taken to prevent another one. Only the Government can examine the matters which I have raised. Only the Government can give any answer to them. That is why we want a Government inquiry. I am asking for this on behalf of the Thurrock Council, and on behalf of the residents of South Stifford in West Thurrock.
The people there have had a harrowing experience, one they will never forget. For days and nights they lived in an atmosphere of danger, and they want to be assured, and they have a right to be assured, that this dread threat has been removed forever. This assurance should come from the highest authority, from the Government.
I am glad that in the final paragraph of his letter to me my hon. Friend said:
I can assure them
—that is, the council and the residents—
that all the authorities concerned will be reviewing their own field of responsibility and will be taking a critical look at the present form of controls.
The chief authority concerned is the Government, so I am glad to note that the Government will be reviewing their field of responsibility and taking a critical look at the present form of controls. That is pretty good, but it is still not quite good enough.
The last thing that I want to ask for is that the people be told, and told out loud, about this review and about this critical look at the form of controls. That is why I am asking for this Government inquiry on behalf of the council and on behalf of the people who live in this danger zone.

2.5 p.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Merlyn Rees): I fully share the concern which prompted my hon. Friend the hon. Member for Thurrock (Mr. Delargy) to speak on this subject today, and I am glad to have this opportunity of clarifying the Government's position in relation to the important issues of public safety which he has raised. One of the first matters in which I had to be involved when I first went to the Home Office was this explosion. I thank my hon. Friend for


giving me notice of the matters which he proposed to raise.
My hon. Friend has been in the House for considerably longer than I have, and the last thing that he would want is to be patronised by me, but I must tell the House that right from the beginning my hon. Friend has been in touch with the Home Office about this issue. He has been as much involved with this matter as any hon. Member could be. This is not something that my hon. Friend has raised in the last few days because an opportunity has arisen for an Adjournment debate. He has been involved in this issue right from the beginning.
My hon. Friend has described the explosion last September at 46 East Street, South Stifford, and there is no reason for me to go over the details again. I was sorry to hear of the accident to Mrs. Glover and her child, and I hope that both have fully recovered. I agree that for the residents in the area this must have been a very harrowing experience.
There is no statutory requirement—and I shall come to the point about what one can do about this—for an explosion of this kind to be notified to my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, and we did not learn of the explosion until a few days after it had occurred, when the South Stifford Residents' Association wrote to us. We immediately called for a report from Thurrock Urban District Council, the local authority in whose area the explosion occurred. We discovered that the Council had already engaged a technical consultant to make a detailed investigation. We learned that there had been an earlier history of complaints from local residents about the smell of petroleum spirit and that these had been investigated by the local authority and by the Gas Board with no positive result.
At about the time the Council's consultant began his investigations the council discovered that apart from spillages already known to it there had been a considerable spillage of petroleum spirit in the area about two years previously. The consultant's preliminary inquiries showed that petrol was present in the ground at a number of places in the area of East Street, and although the direct cause of the explosion could not be established at that stage, the provisional conclusion was that spilled petrol had seeped underground in the

direction of East Street. My hon. Friend knows the area better than I do. He is an expert on it, as well as being a Member of Parliament. Seepage depends to a large degree on the slope of the ground, and petrol was present in the ground in a number of places in the area of East Street.

Mr. Delargy: It is very low-lying ground near the river. It is obvious that petrol would seep into it.

Mr. Rees: As I was saying, the provisional conclusion was that spilled petrol had seeped underground in the direction of East Street. Vapour had then risen up from the ground through the floor of the house and had formed an explosive mixture which had been ignited in some way, perhaps by a pilot light. The possibility that the explosion had been caused by gas was investigated, but rejected. All subsequent action proceeded on the basis of this preliminary assessment of the cause of the explosion and there now seems little doubt that this assumption was correct.
As my hon. Friend said, South Stifford lies in that part of Essex which borders on the Thames, and, as we have heard, contains a number of extensive oil storage depots fed by pipe-lines from jetties where sea-tankers tie up to off-load. I well recall that that part of the world was a target in the last war for the same reasons. The storage depôts are licensed by Thurrock Council under the Petroleum (Consolidation) Act, 1928. Under this Act, it is entirely for the local authority concerned to decide whether a licence should be issued or not, and if so, on what conditions, but an applicant may appeal to my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary against the decision of a local authority if he has been refused licence or objects to any conditions the local authority proposes to attach to it. The standard conditions on which licences are issued by the Thurrock Council for the storage of petroleum spirit include a requirement that spillages should be reported to it. My right hon. Friend has no powers in this respect.
As for pipe-lines, as opposed to storage, the position is, broadly speaking, that these may not be laid except in accordance with the provisions of the Pipe-lines Act, 1962, which, among other matters, are designed to ensure that any product


conveyed in pipe-lines will present no undue hazard to the public. In particular, spillages from pipe-lines must be reported to the appropriate fire, police, river and sewerage authorities. If there is a burst or explosion in the pipe-line, or the product in the pipe-line ignites, a report must be made to my right hon. Friend the Minister of Power. My hon. Friend is right; two Government Departments are involved. But I must emphasise that the Minister of Power, like the Home Secretary, has no power to deal with spillages as such.
I understand that three spillages may be relevant to the present incident. One of these, in August, 1968, involved the loss of 36 tons of product from premises licensed by the Thurrock Council. A ton of petroleum spirit is a considerable amount. The other two spillages were from pipe-lines. The first, in July, 1966, was caused by a faulty connection in a pipe-line, and 368 tons were lost. The second spillage occurred in October, 1966, when 40 tons were lost as a result of a corroded pipe. The first of these two pipe-line spillages was not reported at the time either to the Thurrock Council or to any other statutory authority.
Responsibility for dealing with spillages of this kind under the law as it stands is primarily a matter for the local authority in pursuance of its normal statutory functions in connection with public health, highways, sewerage and other services. It was clearly right, however, that central Government should give what help it could, and my right hon. Friend accordingly arranged for Her Majesty's Inspectors of Explosives, who are his technical advisers in petroleum spirit matters, to visit the area and to keep in close touch with the council's advisers. It was at that point that I came into the picture; I am speaking personally now and not for the Department.
Similar arrangements were made in the case of the Inspector of Pipe-lines by my right hon. Friend the Minister of Power. The Government are therefore closely in touch with all that is being done to reduce to the minimum any possible risk to the residents from the spillages I have mentioned.
It is not necessary for me to describe in detail this afternoon the nature of the investigations that have taken place or the many complex factors which have had to be taken into account by the council's technical adviser who has been acting in consultation with the council's own professional staff, the oil companies concerned, the Essex River Authority and Her Majesty's Inspectors of Explosives. I need only say that these investigations have been both thorough and far-reaching.
The investigations, which included the drilling of bore-holes at strategic positions in the affected area, pointed to the presence of an appreciable volume of petrol in the ground immediately to the east of the railway sidings, that is, in the opposite direction from East Street. This petrol is considered to be potentially recoverable, and a trench has therefore been dug across the area so that the petrol may drain into it and then be pumped out. The technical experts are agreed that this method should effectively dispose of most of the concentration of petrol in this area.
There is no evidence to suggest that there is a similar concentration of petrol on the other side of the railway sidings towards East Street. I want to make it clear that my previous reference was to the area away from East Street. Similar recovery methods in this area are therefore not appropriate. Tests of air and soil samples, however, have shown the presence of petroleum spirit in the earth beneath the houses in East Street in the form of impregnated gravel about 10 feet below the surface. Arrangements have therefore been made by the council for residents to report any smells so that an investigation may be made at once whether a dangerous atmosphere is present. The council is also carrying out sparodic tests within the area with a view to its receiving the earliest possible warning of the presence of petroleum vapour.
As a precaution against the possibility of concentrations of vapour collecting beneath the floorboards of the houses in East Street the council has accepted the recommendation of the expert advisers that the houses which are not already built on concerete oversites should have some form of sealing. The council is


exploring various methods of doing this, and the work will be put in hand, with the agreement of the householders concerned, as soon as it has decided which method will be best.
All the work is being carried out at the expense of the oil companies concerned. I should like to make it clear that all the technical experts, including H.M. Inspectors of Explosives, agree that any hazards remaining in the residential area can be reduced to negligible proportions by means of these precautions, and that householders need no longer be afraid. There is no question, for example, of its being necessary to replace all domestic gas appliances.
As my hon. Friend explained, the residents in the area affected have understandably expressed their grave concern at the possibility of another explosion and have repeatedly called for a public inquiry so as to elicit the full facts relating to the present situation and, in particular, to obtain reassurances for the future. The need for a public inquiry has been very carefully considered by my right hon. Friend but he has concluded that in the light of the exhaustive investigations undertaken under the direction of the council, and the agreed remedial measures already in hand, such an inquiry would serve no useful purpose. I am satisfied that all practical steps to secure the safety of the residents in East Street are being taken: this is clearly the most immediate and urgent task.
In the longer term, the council will be turning its attention to such questions as how best to avoid a repetition of this kind of situation, and what action, if any, should be taken in respect of the oil companies concerned. In all this, by statute, this is the responsibility of the local authority, but in matters such as this the expert advice of Her Majesty's Inspectors of Explosives will continue to be available to the council so long as it is needed.

Mr. Delargy: Besides the benefit of the advice of experts, could not the Government give an undertaking that at least the co-ordination of all these inquiries should be helped by the Government and not left entirely to the urban district council?

Mr. Rees: I remember this matter very clearly, not just because it has been raised today but because it was one of the first matters which faced me when I transferred from another Department. On that occasion, co-ordination of authorities which were concerned with this took place—I am thinking nationally now—and there was discussion of what was being done locally. This was very much on my mind, because one of my previous responsibilities, in the context of the Services, had been what happens in a national disaster. My present Department was certainly looking at the matter in exactly the same way, considering what was going on, whether the oil companies had been approached, who was down there dealing with the matter, whether the police and fire authorities had been informed. That was being done and it did not need my arrival at the Department to have it done.
Apart from co-ordination, we are taking a critical look at existing statutory safeguards and procedures in the light of the very full investigations which have taken place into this incident and the lessons which have been learned. Something of this kind has happened, and obviously one must see whether the existing legislation is the right way to deal with it. Of course, the area that my hon. Friend represents is a big area and is not typical of the country as a whole. Nevertheless, a critical look is being taken at this matter in the light of all the information which we have and the lessons which have been learned.
I need hardly say that the Government's concern, like that of my hon. Friend arises as much from our appreciation of local feelings as from anything else. I hope that what I have said will serve to reassure the residents of South Stifford and underline the practical interest which the Government have in the council's efforts to deal with this unprecedented situation.
My hon. Friend has completely understood the situation—the two Government Departments which are involved, the two pieces of legislation which have to be operated—and he has also taken the point, without my telling him, that the local authorities have a responsibility under the legislation. I should like to repeat that we have taken note of the


investigations and what they have thrown up and that we are looking very critically to see whether, after this passage of time—one of the Acts is relatively old and the other much younger, the 1962 Act, although that is the responsibility of the Minister of Power, who will, of course, take note of what has been said today—there are any lessons to be learned for the longer term.
In the shorter term, I hope that what I have said will reassure my hon. Friend's constituents, because we all realise that this has not been a pleasant experience. But they should be reassured that, whoever else has been making representations and chasing Government Departments, my hon. Friend has been in the lead in that respect.

M11 (WANSTEAD AND WOODFORD)

2.24 p.m.

Mr. Patrick Jenkin: On 4th December last, the Ministry of Transport published a proposal for the Redbridge-Stump Cross section of the M11 motorway, the London to Cambridge motorway. The route has come to be known as the Roding Valley route and my interest in this matter arises because the Roding Valley runs from the north to the south of my constituency. The statutory period for objection to the Minister's proposal expired last month and the Ministry is now deciding whether or not to hold a public inquiry. It is not my intention now to raise any of the matters which would properly fall within the purview of the inspector should a public inquiry be held; a large number of objections have been received by the Ministry, including one from the London Borough of Redbridge, and I believe that the Minister cannot do otherwise than hold a public inquiry.
I have received a huge correspondence about this matter. I have attended a good many public meetings, as have officials of the Ministry, and I have nothing but the highest praise for the patience and good humour with which they have dealt often with very difficult meetings. The Residents' Associations in the area are up in arms and a Roding Valley Motorway Opposition group has been formed and is very active.
From all this activity, three issues seem to have emerged which would be outside the scope of any public inquiry which the Minister might decide to hold—matters of policy for which the Minister is responsible and yet which go to the heart of the difficulties now confronting thousands of my constituents. These three matters of complaint are, first, the piecemeal publication of the route for the M11, second, the non-availability to the public of any of the cost calculations on which the Ministry's proposal has been founded and, third—this is a more general point, to which I shall return—the inadequacy of present compensation laws covering motorways through urban areas.
First, the piecemeal publication of the M11 route. I fear that it is necessary to give a little of the past history to explain the situation. On the original Essex and Hertfordshire county development plans, the route for the London-Cambridge motorway followed an entirely different line, further west up the Lea Valley. As long ago as 1960, the Ministry announced that it was examining the Roding Valley as a possible alternative route and in 1964, within a few weeks of the General Election, the Ministry announced that the Roding Valley was the preferred route.
In December, 1966, the Ministry published the first draft proposals for the Roding Valley route and proceeded to consult the local authorities. However, this proposal took the route from the north only as far south as Chigwell and the line ended in the middle of a field a few hundred yards north of the boundary of my constituency. At that time, it was my primary concern that no final decision should be taken on the Roding Valley route until the whole route was known. I was determined that my constituency and, indeed, the local authority in whose area it stands should not be presented with a fait accompli, decisions having been taken on the northern part of the route, obliging the Ministry, therefore, to adopt the Roding Valley for the southern part.
I made this point in an exchange of correspondence in January and February, 1967, with the late Stephen Swingler, and at first his view was that the Ministry would be justified in going ahead with the plan as published.
He wrote to me on 9th February stating:
The published route … has been terminated at a point where we are free to adopt the most suitable line for the extension southwards and the making of this scheme should not prejudice any decisions we make about the remainder of the route after consultation with the local councils.…
That was clearly unsatisfactory. I had an opportunity, in a debate on 24th February, 1967, to press my point. I was able to elicit an undertaking from Mr. Swingler which appeared to give me what I sought. Two short quotations from that debate will make the position clear. I said:
… the line south of the periphery of the developed area must be considered as a whole. If it is considered piecemeal, as the Ministry is threatening, it will make a complete farce of the whole procedure. Local authorities will be faced with a fait accompli and will be unable to argue the merits of the alternative schemes, and all this planning and consultation procedure will be shown to be a complete and empty facade …
Mr. Swingler took the point and, in his reply, he said:
I can assure the hon. Member and his constituents that we are now getting on rapidly with discussion of the southern link road and the linking scheme".
He then added these relevant words:
I am sure that when it comes to any form of inquiry the necessary details will be available to those who may wish to put forward alternatives or to make objections to the scheme as a whole."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 24th February, 1967; Vol. 741, c. 2142, 2168.]
Nothing could have been clearer. However, I felt it right, as that had been an extempore answer given during a debate, to confirm it. I tabled a Written Question for 8th March, 1967, in which I asked whether it was the intention of the right hon. Lady who is now the Secretary of State for Employment and Productivity to publish the proposals for the route south of Chigwell. Mr. Swingler replied:
No; but my right hon. Friend will consider any formal views"—
note the word "formal"—that implies publication—
of the local authorities concerned on the whole route before taking a decision on the published scheme."—[OFFICIAL, REPORT, 8th March, 1967; Vol. 742, c. 271.]
Further, when later it appeared that there might be some suggestion that the Ministry was going to resile from that, I took the matter up again with the Parliamentary Secretary, the hon. Member for Glasgow, Woodside (Mr. Carmichael),

and he gave me in clear terms the assurance I was seeking, for he said in a letter dated 27th October, 1967:
… I can assure you that it is our intention to honour the assurance given in reply to your Question in the House on 8th March last and to consider the views of the local authorities concerned on the whole route before taking a decision on the published Scheme.
I am happy to rest on the words that were used by the late Mr. Swingler in the debate in 1967, when he said:
… the necessary details will be available to those who may wish to put forward alternatives or to make objections to the scheme as a whole."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 24th February, 1967; Vol. 741, c. 2168.]
In the event, that scheme was modified. It was withdrawn and in its place two years later, last December, a second draft proposal was published. This time the line came a bit further south: of course, it was not yet the complete route.
It came as far as a huge and complex proposed interchange in South Woodford, where it links with two other proposed trunk roads, Ringway 2, as we must now call it, the A406, and the proposed Radial Road 7, which I understand will be renamed the M12. From there there was to be a spur leading off further south to link with the A12 at Redbridge.
But the main line of the motorway stops short at that interchange, this time in the middle of a sports field, and it is left pointing like a pistol at the very heart of Wanstead. As everybody knows, it is this road that will eventually be extended to complete the motorway by linking up with the G.L.C.s Ringway I at Hackney Wick.
Following the publication of this plan, I tabled a Question in which I asked the Minister when it was proposed to publish the rest of the M.11 route, down as far as Hackney Wick. On 20th December I received a Written Answer in which I was told that publication of the proposals was not expected before the end of 1970. In other words, we must wait two years. In the meantime, the Ministry is pressing ahead with the statutory procedures for the part that it has published.
I believe that this is a grave breach of faith in the face of undertakings given to me by the late Mr. Swingler and confirmed in subsequent Written Answers and in correspondence. I am sure that in its heart the Ministry recognises this. I believe that, because Ministers are


honourable men, they are gravely embarrassed over this. Being embarrassed, what have they done? They have sought to pretend that the details which they have now published in fact represent the complete scheme. They have called it the "Stump Cross to Redbridge" section of the Motorway, implying that the link to the A12 is the main part of the motorway. They have begun to talk of the section to link up with the motorway as the "M11 extension" to Hackney Wick, in the same way as one refers to the M1 extension. In a Written Answer on 20th December the right hon. Gentleman the Minister advanced the ludicrous claim—ludicrous to anybody who knows the area:
The route now published is a viable scheme in its own right."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 20th December, 1968, Vol. 775, c. 530.]
If the right hon. Gentleman seriously believes that this is a viable scheme, then he has been most gravely misinformed. If the M11 were completed in accordance with the proposals so far published the result would be utter chaos. The A12 is already seriously overcrowded for most of the day with lengthy delays at many intersections, not least at the crossing at the George in Wanstead. The North Circular Road into which other link roads feed, is notoriously inadequate, and even with the proposed improvements at Waterworks Corner it will still be incapable of absorbing extra motorway traffic.
The M11 scheme will not be viable until there is a completed road through to Hackney Wick and I am sure that the Parliamentary Secretary will not deny that the Minister takes the same view. Indeed, according to the detailed plans for the South Woodford intersection, the links to the A12 are actually designated "slip Nos. 2 and 3", being the north-bound and south-bound links respectively.
I do not believe that the Ministry should be allowed to evade in this shabby way the solemn undertakings which were given not once, but on three separate occasions, in this House and outside. I appreciate that the Ministry has difficulties in this matter. I appreciate that the section south of South Woodford down to Hackney Wick is by far the most difficult, and certainly the most expensive, in the whole of the 40 mile route. The Ministry faces an agonising choice; either to cut a swathe

through densely developed parts of South Woodford, Wanstead and Leytonstone which would involve the destruction of many hundreds of sound properties built in the last 30 or 40 years, or to destroy Wanstead Park which is probably the loveliest piece of natural parkland anywhere in London north of the Thames.
Yet if the part of the Roding Valley route which has so far been published is confirmed and built, the Ministry will have no alternative but to face this agonising choice. It will be too late for anybody to say, "This is impossible! We must look elsewhere."
The story does not end there. The Ministry has repeatedly given as its reason for preferring the Roding Valley route to the Lea Valley route the fact that it is about £15 million cheaper. How can the Ministry make a valid comparison if it does not know what the line will be for the most difficult, the most expensive, and the most critical section of the whole route? When it is remembered that the southern end of the Lea Valley consists to a very large extent of derelict industrial land, of disused reservoirs and of acres of railway sidings, the people in my constituency are highly sceptical, to put it no higher, when they find that the cost comparisons, on the basis of which the Ministry's plans are put forward, carefully omit the last three vital miles of the route.
I shall be told, no doubt the Parliamentary Secretary will tell me, that no motorways would ever be built if we waited until the whole lot could be built. As a general proposition that cannot be challenged. But it utterly begs the question in a case like this, where the Ministry's case rests primarily on the arguments of comparative costs, where the last vital link poses such exceptionally difficult problems of amenity, and where, above all, clear and unequivocal undertakings have been given in the House of Commons to the effect that
the necessary details will be available to those who may wish to make objections to the scheme as a whole.
The London Borough of Redbridge is deeply concerned about this point, and at its meeting on Tuesday it passed a minute which recommended
That the Ministry of Transport be urged to publicise their proposals for extending the M11 motorway to the motorway box at Hackney and that an inquiry should deal with the whole length of the motorway.


I can tell the Parliamentary Secretary that if he does not meet that request from the London Borough of Redbridge, any public inquiry which his right hon. Friend decides to hold will be nothing but an empty sham.
I turn to two other points. The first is the non-availability of the cost calculations. The objectors will wish to argue at the public inquiry that the Lea Valley proposal as originally envisaged was the right one and they will want to challenge the Ministry's cost comparisons. They must have available to them the data to enable them to do this before the public inquiry. They will want to employ consulting engineers and they may wish to be represented at the inquiry by counsel.
The Ministry inevitably starts on an exercise of this sort with huge advantages over the private citizen, and it does not seem necessary that it should add to those advantages by concealing basic data until it is unveiled at the public inquiry itself. I hope that the Parliamentary Secretary will be able to authorise his staff to reveal in the fullest possible way, the cost calculations and the traffic surveys—another series of needed figures—on which the Ministry's proposals are based.
I come finally to the vexed question of compensation. There will be no dispute between us that the law at present gives no right to compensation unless the property is on the actual line of the route, the land itself is actually required.

Mr. Speaker: If the law gives no right, the hon. Gentleman cannot propose its amendment during an Adjournment debate.

Mr. Jenkin: I appreciate the problem, Mr. Speaker, and I merely draw attention to the lacuna; I know I may not ask the Parliamentary Secretary to introduce legislation.
The blight provisions do not apply to land which, in planners' jargon, is merely "blighted by proximity". I have examples in my constituency, particularly in Uplands Road in Woodford Bridge, of houses with short back gardens whose occupiers will find themselves within a stone's throw of a motorway on a 20-ft. high embankment with thousands of vehicles an hour roaring past and who will not get a penny piece of compensation. Their properties are unsaleable, and even if they find a

buyer, they cannot find anybody to take a mortgage.
This is totally unacceptable. The conmunity is simply stealing from the individual citizen; public authorities cannot be allowed to drive huge motorways through densely built-up areas and inflict severe loss on thousands of adjacent residents without paying compensation. The G.L.C. has recognised this problem with its motorway box and has sought help from the Ministry and has asked for the necessary statutory powers. But it is not only a question of compensation; it is also a question of environment. If the Ministry is building roads for the future, it must build them in an environment of which later generations will be proud.
I have dealt separately with three points, but they are inter-related. Unless the whole route is published, there cannot be a realistic cost comparison. To enable such cost comparisons to be made, the Ministry's figures must be made available before the inquiry. If to these cost figures there were to be added the cost of paying proper compensation for properties blighted by proximity, I strongly suspect that in the case of the M11 the alleged cost advantage claimed for the Roding Valley over the Lea Valley would be completely altered.
When in November, 1964, the Roding Valley route was said to be the preferred route, I had been in the House for about three weeks. When I went to my constituency, I made the point clearly, in a public speech, that it was futile for us all to argue for a better road system and at the same time to say that on no account must it go past our front doors. The Ministry for its part has a firm duty to satisfy the public that the route which it has chosen is best in all the circumstances and that those who suffer loss will be properly compensated.
If the Minister proceeds with the present piecemeal proposals, if he refuses to disclose essential cost data, if he seeks to rely on cost comparisons which are at best incomplete and at worst positively fallacious, if he is determined to push forward a scheme which will cause widespread unrequitted loss to hundreds of private citizens, he will inevitably further undermine public faith in our whole democratic process. Because I know that the Parliamentary Secretary fully shares my anxiety that this should not


happen, I am confident that he will seek to meet the case which I have made and not to reject it.

2.47 p.m.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Transport (Mr. Bob Brown): I thank the hon. Member for Wanstead and Woodford (Mr. Patrick Jenkin) for his kind remarks about the officials in my Department in their handling of negotiations with himself and his constituents. I am also grateful to him for raising a number of interesting points about the M11 scheme. I congratulate him on the tenacity which he has shown on behalf of his constituents. My life would have been slightly easier if he had not been so tenacious, but I do not complain about that.
Questions have been raised which relate not only to the M11 but to major road proposals generally, and particularly to the difficult and complex problems of planning urban roads. The hon. Member has underlined these issues, which are of great concern to all of us—politicians, engineers, planners and administrators alike.
The hon. Member has raised the broad question of whether the Roding Valley is the right place for this motorway, or whether it would have been better sited in the Lea Valley. As hon. Members will probably be aware, the original proposals for this road, as shown in the Essex and Hertfordshire county development plans, were for a primary route running up the Lea Valley. The early preliminary surveys undertaken by our consultants included very wide-ranging traffic surveys and study of a number of possible lines in terms of cost, physical effect and traffic requirements. The conclusion which emerged from these investigations was that a major change in the route was desirable. Accordingly, a preference for the Roding Valley was announced in 1964. The then Minister notified his intention of initiating discussion with local authorities on this basis.
Since then, of course, much further work has been done on the general traffic problem in this region and the future network of roads which would be required to solve it. These further studies confirmed our view that the

choice of the Roding Valley was the right one.
This is not to say that there is less of a traffic problem in the Lea Valley than the Roding Valley. On the contrary; unlike the Roding Valley, the Lea Valley has a number of heavily trafficked routes running across it, and forecasts of the growth and desires of this local traffic point to the need for a new high capacity route down this valley as well. In fact, a possible route for such a road is still safeguarded in the county development plan. What has become apparent is that it would not be practicable to build in the Lea Valley a motorway which would carry the heavy local traffic movements in addition to inter-regional traffic. The most economical and practical solution is to build two separate highways, but the terrain in the Lea Valley presents major engineering problems and there just is not sufficient room there for two major routes. So we thought it right to take the inter-regional M11 route out of the Lea Valley and leave the protected route for the inter-urban road which will be needed there in the longer term.
A further advantage of transferring the M11 motorway route to the Roding Valley is that it dovetails more easily into the road network as a whole. There are plans, of which hon. Members are no doubt aware, for building another motorway, the M12, formerly known as Radial Route 7, from the Brentwood By-pass to South Woodford to relieve the A12 and Eastern Avenue. The preferred route for this other motorway, details of which are expected to be published later this year, runs into the Roding Valley from the east, some distance north of the North Circular Road. By routing the M11 through the Roding Valley we can conveniently link up with the M12 and cater for the through traffic into the central London area with one new motorway instead of the two which would otherwise be required, thus reducing the number of inter-regional routes into the heart of the metropolis.
The ultimate effect upon residential property and the community generally of the road network as a whole will thus be substantially reduced. This is most important. The impact on the Wanstead and Woodford areas is regretted but it is quite impossible to build new roads into


London without encroaching upon property and upon the limited amount of open space which remains. This is a regrettable effect when building motorways which we have to face. By careful design and landscaping we aim to keep this effect to a basic minimum.

Mr. Patrick Jenkin: The hon. Gentleman has confirmed what is not disputed betwen us, that eventually these roads will have to get to the middle of London. Will he deal with the question of piecemeal publication?

Mr. Brown: Yes, Sir.
Last, but not least, there is the question of cost. We believe that the present combination of routes and the siting of roads is the most economical which can be achieved. Because of the difference in terrain there would be a saving estimated at £15 to £16 million on the M11 by routing it down the Roding Valley instead of the Lea Valley. If we took the M11 down the Lea Valley and combined it with the inter-urban route, the extra cost required to achieve the same overall highway facilities, including the connection with the M12 motorway, would bring the total difference in cost of over £30 million. Moreover, the damage to industrial and residential property, and to amenity, would be greater than with the network as at present planned.
It has also been suggested that we were at fault in dealing with this new motorway in piecemeal fashion. This seems to me to be less than fair in this particular case since we have published at one go over 38 miles of route, together with our proposals for interchanges and alterations to the existing road system. In all the promises about publishing the whole route which Mr. Swingler is alleged to have made, he was quite clearly doing so in the context of the present proposal—that is, from Redbridge to south of Cambridge.
There are very real and complex problems in co-ordinating plans for continuing the M11 motorway further into London with proposals for other major roads in this area. Meanwhile the published proposals for the M11 motorway are consistent with the overall plan and are viable in themselves. To delay this whole length of motorway until all the outstanding problems concerning the relatively short southern section have been worked out in detail would be unnecessarily to forgo

for an indefinite period the considerable economic benefits to be derived from its early completion.
Plans to meet further needs by extending the M11 to Hackney Wick and the North Circular to the A13 and the new river crossing at Thamesmead are now under consideration. Choice of the most appropriate routes is going to be very difficult indeed, and will take time. Both schemes have already been announced as in "preparation". Detailed planning is going ahead but we do not expect to be in a position to publish proposals for either scheme before the end of 1970.
There may be some additional traffic congestion in Wanstead during the interim period between completion of M11 to Redbridge and these subsequent schemes. We will do our best to minimise this but I would certainly not wish to discount it altogether. What we have to weigh is the effect of extra traffic on a few roads against the considerable relief the M11 will bring to other roads in the area and in particular to the All which at present carries heavy traffic through built-up areas and shopping centres. Our present proposals may not be the complete answer but they will make a substantial and worth while contribution to increased safety and reduced congestion.
These are the general considerations which have guided us. There are also many more detailed considerations. I would prefer not to enlarge on such points of detail this afternoon because in view of the concern and anxieties expressed on behalf of communities and individuals affected by the route as a whole my right hon. Friend has decided to have his proposals aired at a public inquiry before reaching a decision on whether to make the motorway scheme with or without modification.
The inquiry will consider not only the proposed line of the motorway but also the detailed proposals for the treatment of junctions and existing roads and footpaths affected by the motorway. A formal announcement of the name of the independent inspector appointed and of the date and place of the inquiry will be made later this month, and all those who have made representations during the objection period which followed the publication of the various schemes and orders will be notified individually. I stress that


when the public inquiry is announced all objectors will be given a statement of the Minister's proposals.
I should now like to turn to the question of compensation which has been raised. I shall do my best to keep in order. There seems to me to be no insuperable problem in this respect where property owners are directly affected by the motorway proposals. The decline in the market value of their property as a result of part acquisition, or the full market value where the property is to be acquired as a whole, can be assessed objectively and related to the payment of compensation. But, as has been pointed out by the hon. Member in this debate, a motorway scheme, and, indeed, any other development scheme in the private as well as the public sector, might have implications for the value of properties in the vicinity of the scheme but not actually physically affected by the scheme works.
It is much more difficult to assess these implications on a monetary basis. There are wide differences of opinion about these matters. In some cases such properties may be regarded as reduced in value, for instance by noise intrusion. In other cases they may be regarded as enhanced in value. This is not often mentioned. An example is the property having convenient access to the motorway network. Another example is the house fronting on to local routes where traffic congestion and noise is substantially reduced by the diversion of traffic on to the motorway. To impose on a public developer an obligation to pay compensation in respect of all consequential effects on property values would put him in a much less favourable position than a private developer. This would be neither fair nor reasonable.
As the hon. Member knows, this very difficult matter is now being considered as part of a general study on the whole question of compensation law which is being co-ordinated by my right hon. Friend the Minister of Planning and Land. The Ministry of Transport is closely associated with this study, and noise difficulties of the kind mentioned by the hon. Member are certainly being taken very much into account.
There are other ways of containing the noise problem—by attacking it at source.

Much research and effort is being done in this field both by way of regulating vehicle noise and in other ways such as investigations into road surfaces to reduce tyre noise, and the use of baffles or screens to deflect and absorb sound. Practical steps have already been taken in this direction. Last year, construction and use regulations were made introducing statutory noise limits and the powers necessary to enforce them. These regulations not only place some limitations on the use of abnormally noisy vehicles, but are intended in the longer term also to reduce general noise levels by limiting the potential noise of new vehicles, which must meet new standards from next year.
We still have a lot more to learn about this subject. Much valuable work is being carried out by the Building Research Station and also by the Ministry's Road Research Laboratory. Indeed, the Laboratory, in collaboration with Keele University, is to go ahead with a research programme on the scientific evaluation of noise nuisance in residential areas.
Noise intrusion can also be limited by careful highway design and routing. This now takes in noise considerations as a matter of course. My right hon. Friend's Advisory Committee on the Landscape Treatment of Trunk Roads has been enlarged and will shortly be strengthened by the formation of an urban subcommittee. In addition, an architect-planning officer has been appointed to give professional advice on matters of environmental planning and design—particularly in urban areas. Our aim is to ensure that expert advice on amenity aspects of highway design is available right from the early stages of planning a new scheme.
In conclusion, may I say that I share with the hon. Member for Wanstead and Woodford his concern at the effect the M11 will have upon residents in that area. I hope that this debate has helped to reasure them, and other residents along the route as a whole, that we shall do everything we can to reduce such effects, in consultation with the Greater London Council, the Redbridge Council and other organisations concerned. Everyone affected by the motorway proposals will have an opportunity to express their views at a public inquiry before my right hon. Friend reaches a final decision.

RONALD AVARD

3.2 p.m.

Mr. William Price: I am grateful for the opportunity to raise the sad and, in many ways, tragic case of Ronald Avard, a man now 26 years old, who was recently released after spending nearly four years in Rampton Institution for offences which he did not commit. That is not my conclusion alone. It was the view of the Home Secretary, who ordered Mr. Avard's release after a top level police investigation. He is now to get compensation, and, somewhat belatedly, justice is being done.
I am grateful to my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State for the time, trouble and work he has put into this case. He has throughout given me every possible assistance, and I suspect that this matter has caused him some anguish. I wish that to be on the record, because, while I have no intention of conducting a witch hunt against anybody, I shall raise the manner in which the matter was treated by the Home Office in the earlier stages.
The circumstances which led to Mr. Avard going to Rampton are very simple. He was charged with attempting to rape a six-year-old girl and with indecent assault on an 11-year-old girl. He made a complete confession of both offences in considerable detail and he duly appeared at the Rugby Magistrates' Court. A prima facie case was established, and he was sent to Birmingham Assizes.
This man is mentally retarded. His age is given at between 7 and 10 years. The assize court took the view, quite properly, that he was unfit to plead. He was committed to Rampton and the matter was forgotten. The worrying feature of this case is that in all probability he would have stayed there for the rest of his life had it not been for the efforts of one man, Mr. Frank Coughlan, wh is a co-operative society employee. During his rounds he called on the Avard family and the family of the 11-year-old girl and a young boy who was with her at the time of the attack. Mr. Coughlan convinced himself over a lengthly period that the wrong man was being detained, and eventually he persuaded Mr. Avard to bring the matter to my attention.
The first letter which I received from Mr. Avard was on 26th February, 1968. It was by coincidence, the morning of 26th February, 1969, that Ronald Avard returned home. It took dozens of letters, a long series of interviews and a police investigation before we could establish his innocence.
I became satisfied that an injustice had been done a long time ago, from the moment that the 11-year-old girl made a statement to me. Obviously I would not wish to identify her because she is covered by the law. She said:
The man who committed the offence was not Ronald Avard. I had known Ronald Avard for seven or eight years and I could not have made any mistake with his identity. I saw a policeman that evening and was also interviewed by a policewoman. I was not asked about Ronald Avard and I did not at any time say that it was him. The police asked me to look at a number of pictures of men but I could not identify anyone as the man who attacked me. The man who attacked me was much older and taller than Ronald Avard.
The girl's mother said in a statement:
I have read the statement just made by my daughter and I can confirm that what she says is true. She has not changed her story—she has said from the beginning that the man who attacked her was not Ronald Avard. I tried to make it clear to the police officers that my daughter was satisfied that it was not Ronald Avard but they did not appear to be interested. My daughter has satisfied me that the man who committed this offence was not Ronald Avard.
The statement of the boy, who at that time was aged eight and is now aged 12, was as follows:
I was with
the girl
when the man came up. I had seen Ronnie Avard in the recreation ground many times so I would have recognised him. The man who came up to Linda was not Ronnie Avard This man was older and taller. When the police saw me Ronnie Avard was not mentioned.
That boy's mother made a statement which said, quite simply:
My son has said all along that the man who attacked
the girl
was not Ronnie Avard. David was asked by the police to look at pictures of a number of men, including Ronnie Avard, and he was unable to identify anyone as the man who committed this offence".
The crucial factor in this case was that these children had known Ronald Avard for a long time. In any community the


simple person—and we must face the fact that Ronald Avard is a simple person—is known. Everybody knew Ronald Avard and his dog. In those circumstances, one is entitled to ask why these facts did not come out in court. In my submission, the answer is because the children never gave evidence, and that was due to Section 27 of the Children and Young Persons Act, 1963.
I was a High Court reporter at the time that that Act was passed. It allows the evidence of a child to be given in committal proceedings involving sexual offences by way of a written statement if the defence raises no objection. I support that Act, and even if the rules of debate allowed me to do so—and obviously they do not—I have no intention of arguing here or anywhere else that it should be changed. I have a young family, and I have no wish for my children to be dragged through the courts in cases of this nature.
However, I am bound to suggest that this case has spotlighted a possible loophole in Section 27 of that Act—

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman is being fair, but he cannot in this debate close the loophole.

Mr. Price: I hope to proceed without incurring any further displeasure, Mr. Speaker. You have been kind to me already.
My case is that if those two children had gone into court they would presumably have been asked whether the man in the dock committed the offences. If their story is true—and it now appears that it is—they would have said "No". Surely that would have meant Ronald Avard's instant discharge. But that did not happen. The magistrates were satisfied with the confession, and so was the higher court where the only evidence was of a medical nature. Everything in this case revolves around that confession and I am bound to question the manner in which it was taken and the circumstances which led to it.
One issue remains in dispute between the Under-Secretary and myself. He is convinced that the confession was made in the presence of the father. Mr. Avard is adamant that he was present only to witness it being signed. Whether that is so or not—I have to admit that

memory can play tricks after so long a period—one fact is not in dispute. Ronald Avard spent nearly four hours at the police station before his father arrived.
I am not in a position to make allegations against the two police officers who conducted this inquiry, and I am by no means sure that I would wish to do so, but I must say that they were dealing with a child—a child whose mental age was seven. I leave it there.
What happened then was fairly straightforward. After seeing the witnesses on three occasions—I wanted to give them plenty of chance to retract if they so wished—I took statements from them and sent them to the Home Office. I received a reply in August which said:
From the inquiries I have made I have no reason to think that Avard was wrongly accused.
In September I had a long interview with the Under-Secretary and his officials at the Home Office, but made no progress, except that he was kind enough to explain to me in detail my rights under the Police Act, 1964. After making a number of further inquiries, I sent the file to the Chief Constable of Warwickshire who quickly instituted an investigation and called in Detective Superintendent Saunders of the Leicester Police Force. Both the Chief Constable and Mr. Saunders operated in the best traditions of the British police force.
The investigation was brilliantly carried out—and I say this not merely because I won; I may even have said it if I had lost. It was rapid and thorough. The outcome within days of the report being received by the Home Office was an announcement that Ronald Avard
must be regarded as innocent of the offences with which he was charged.
Very shortly after that came the decision to pay compensation, and the question of the sum involved is still under discussion.
That is the case of Ronald Avard, a man who, in my view, lost his liberty because of a set of serious and unfortunate circumstances. The police investigation, in my view, was inadequate; the lawyers failed to do their homework and the 1963 Act worked against him. The question one has to ask is this. How can we be certain that someone else is not wrongly detained under similar circumstances? I obviously cannot say that this


is so. Equally the Home Office can only hope that this case is unique.
I should like briefly to raise several points which I believe to be of vital public interest and on which I should like the Under-Secretary's advice. First, is he satisfied that the 1963 Act as it applied in this case is working in the way that Parliament had intended? There was in the case of Ronald Avard no identification parade. I should have thought that was the obvious alternative to the child actually appearing in court. So far as I know, the children were not—certainly the elder girl was not—even shown photographs. Their statements produced in court merely dealt with the attack and attempted to describe the man involved. I suspect that the police, armed with a confession, rested on their laurels, and that, I am bound to suggest is not sufficient.
This brings me to the second point that I wish to raise, the treatment of confessions made by mentally retarded people where there is little or no corroborative evidence. That is certainly the position in this case. Leading medical people who have written to me since this case became public tell me that there is a real danger of a young man like Ronald Avard, perhaps motivated by bravado, confessing to offences, particularly those involving sex. I must put this question to the Under-Secretary, because it is of paramount importance to me: why does the law, which says a man is unfit to plead at his trial, say in effect that he is fit to go to Rugby Police Station, spend four hours there before his father arrives and then make a statement which costs him his liberty for a very long time?
I understand that the term "unfit to plead" means that a person does not know what is happening in court. Is there any reason to believe that Ronnie Avard knew what was happening in that police station? Even with the best will in the world towards the police force, what evidence is there that this boy who did not know what was happening in court was able to look after himself in front of two experienced police officers?
At very best, this is an illogical situation made worse by the fact that the consultant psychiatrist, Dr. Clifford Tetlow, of the Central Hospital, Warwick,

produced this report after examining Ronald Avard at Winson Green Prison. Birmingham:
Examination showed him to be mentally dull, unable to read, or to do the simplest arithmetic, and able to write his name only with great difficulty. He was not aware of the capital of England, or of the reigning Sovereign, and was able to give the days of the week only after much hesitation. He was hardly aware of the nature of what he had done, and was not even aware that he was in prison. He was quite unable to understand the meaning of the word 'guilty', or to understand that his case would be tried in court.
Yet here is a case of a man who was able to give a full and detailed confession which was taken at face value by the police, by the defence lawyers, and by the court, and that is not good enough.
My last point is this. Even if there had been no doubt about his guilt, why did this man go to Rampton, an institution for the criminally insane, for the violent, and for the dangerous? Dr. Tetlow told us in his report to the Assize Court:
He is quiet and docile but is in need of hospital care and supervision which could well be given at a local hospital for the mentally subnormal, there being no need for him to be in a maximum security hospital.
That advice came from a man with long experience in these matters, and it was ignored. I should be grateful to know the basis on which these matters are decided.
I appreciate all the help that I have been given particularly by Mr. Coughlan and significantly by the parents of the children involved in the case of indecent assault. At no stage did I trouble the younger girl. I thought it wrong to resurrect a matter four years old which she has in all probability forgotten, and I hope that she has. I took the view that if I could establish innocence on one charge, the other was bound to follow.
I admire the British system of justice and those who implement it. There are those on this side of the House who think that I am to the right of the Home Secretary. I do not know whether that is true or not, but what I do say is that none of us is beyond making a mistake, and no one any longer doubts that in this case a grievous mistake was made. It is the duty of this House to ensure that it does not happen again.

3.20 p.m.

Mr. Russell Kerr: I intervene briefly for two reasons. First, I wish to pay tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Rugby (Mr. William Price) for the great dedication to duty, persistence and terrier-like qualities he has shown in pursuing this matter. I am sure that I speak for all right hon. and hon. Members of this honourable House when I say that we rejoice with him in the fact that his persistence over the years has had the happy result it has in this instance.
My other reason for speaking is that, by one of the quirks of fate, I have in my constituency of Feltham a case of extraordinary similarity to the one raised by my hon. Friend. It would be improper for me to go into detail in discussing that case this afternoon, and I propose not to do so save to say that it concerns an educationally subnormal person of the mental age of about eight who is currently, and has been for 18 months or thereabouts, incarcerated in the Moss Side institution near Liverpool. He is there because he was convicted, after a number of very untoward happenings in relation to the courts—I am not blaming the courts but more the way his case was handled for him—of indecent assault of a sexual nature.
As I say, I do not wish to discuss the merits or demerits of the case. Negotiations for his release are still going on with the Home Office, and I do not wish to say more about it now. However, having come to certain provisional conclusions of a very firm nature—to put it like that—after a detailed consideration of the case, I learned that the B.B.C. research team which provides background information for the television programme "Cause for Concern" had, some nine months ago, undertaken a close investigation of the same case, without any reference to me—indeed, I was not aware until a late stage that it had undertaken the task—and had independently come to conclusions almost identical with mine, namely, that there was the gravest possible doubt about whether the right person had been arrested and about the method of his present treatment.
I give those facts only to introduce the point which gives me great concern. I refer to the factor—I am not sure that my hon. Friend used the word, though he

touched on it—the factor of suggestibility. That term was just a noun in the dictionary to me before this case came to my attention. It was not until I went to Moss Side as, so to speak, advocate for this youngster, by this time about 16 years of age, to plead for him before the tribunal which the Home Office sets up to review cases of this kind from time to time, that I appreciated just what the factor of suggestibility can mean.
As I stated the case for this youngster, asking for his early release, subject to certain conditions and so on, it was pathetic to see the way in which, when questions were directed to him, he looked at me to see whether he could get any idea of what I wanted him to say. I had no doubt whatever that, if he had gained the impression that I wanted him to say that black is white, then black would have been white, and no hesitation about it.
The point which I am bringing out relates to what my hon. Friend the Member for Rugby has been saying in the sense that part of the reason—a large part of the reason, I am sure—for the doubts which I acquired and which the B.B.C. research team independently acquired centre on the means by which the confession was obtained. It is not that I am making a serious suggestion that there was grossly improper practice or "stand-over" tactics by the police officers concerned, but what worries me most of all is that they themselves, in gaining the confession, were unaware of the existence and importance of the factor of suggestibility.
I urge my hon. Friend the Under-Secretary of State, with all the force at my command, to take up with the Home Secretary the importance of the factor of suggestibility in the context of our administration of justice. It is something which has frightened me when I have seen the possible ways in which this factor can distort justice as we know it. Again renewing my congratulations to my hon. Friend the Member for Rugby on a splendid job well done, I urge the Under-Secretary of State to pay full regard to the point which I have raised in any further discussions which he may have on the subject.

3.25 p.m.

The Under-Secretary of State for the Home Department (Mr. Elystan Morgan): When I wrote to my hon.


Friend the Member for Rugby (Mr. William Price) on 6th March this year, I referred to the sympathy which we are all bound to feel for Mr. Avard in the situation which led to his being detained in Rampton Hospital as a result of charges which we now know to have been mistaken. I am glad to have this opportunity of repeating in the House that expression of the sincere sympathy felt by myself and by my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary for both Mr. Avard and his family and our recognition of the distress and hardship caused to them a long period of time.
Action has now been taken to correct the injustice in so far as it is possible to do so retrospectively. In the light of the fresh information brought to light by the further police inquiry, I advised my right hon. Friend to order Mr. Avard's immediate discharge from Rampton, and this advice he immediately accepted. Since Mr. Avard was never tried and convicted, it was not possible to demonstrate his innocence by the grant of a free pardon, but steps were taken to make clear publicly that he must be regarded as innocent of the offences with which he was charged. In addition, the Home Secretary has authorised an ex gratia payment to Mr. Avard from public funds in consideration of the hardship which he has suffered.
My hon. Friend will, I hope, agree that we have done as much as it is now possible to do to make amends to Mr. Avard for the injustice which he has suffered. It is right, however, that we should look closely at the circumstances of this case in order to see how this unfortunate situation could have arisen and what lessons are to be learned to help us to prevent a similar situation arising again.
My hon. Friend has already dealt with the history of the case in some detail, but I shall take the House over the main facts once again, and I am sure that this is what the House would wish me to do in a matter of such importance.
For this purpose, we must go back as far as 1965. On 20th May that year, a little girl of six was playing with her younger sister in a field in the Lower Hillmorton area of Rugby, when she saw what she described as a "big boy" who called her over to him. He took her

behind a hut, where he took her dress off, behaved indecently with her and tried to have sexual intercourse. When she started to cry the "big boy" went off. A week later, in the same area, an 11-year old girl and a boy of eight went to gather wild flowers for school. The girl was approached by a man who gave her some money to go and buy him some cigarettes. She went off, but then realised that he was similar to the man described to her at school that morning as having interfered with a little girl, the police having circulated a warning to schools following the previous assualt. She thought something might happen to the little boy, so she went back. When she got to the man, the boy was no longer with him, but he made the girl walk in front of him for some distance. He then pushed her over, squeezed her nose and face so that she could not breathe properly, and lifted her skirt up. When she screamed the man ran off towards Rugby.
Intensive police inquiries followed the reports of these two incidents. A police-woman obtained details of the incidents from the two girls concerned. The little girl of six gave a very simple description of the man; the older was able to describe him in rather more detail. The little boy of eight also was seen; he had not seen the assault or heard the girl scream, but he was able to give a description of the man who had spoken to them. In accordance with police procedure, the older girl and the boy were shown photographs of men known to be given to this kind of offence but neither child made any identification from these. This set of photographs did not include one of Ronald Avard, who was not at that time suspected.
On 31st May, 1965, it was decided to question Ronald Avard about his movements, because he was thought to bear some resemblance to the children's description of the man responsible. Knowing of his mental handicap, the police arranged for the questioning to be done by the local beat officer for the area where Ronald Avard lived. This officer knew him well, and had often given him friendly advice and help, and they had an amicable understanding.
In the course of this questioning, which lasted about half an hour, Ronald Avard made an oral admission to the effect


that he had committed both offences. Because of his mental capacity, it was decided that no written statement should be taken from him until his father was present. When Mr. Avard, senior, came to the police station later in the day, he saw his son in the presence of two police officers. I am aware—and this his been corroborated in the speech of my hon. Friend the Member for Rugby—that Mr. Avard, senior, has disputed the police evidence of what then occurred, but in the light of the independent investigation of this complaint I believe that his recollection is at fault. I have found nothing whatsoever to support the very serious allegation that the police officers misrepresented what occurred.
The next part of my narrative follows the evidence of the police officers concerned, and having examined all the evidence, I entirely accept it. When Mr. Avard senior came to the police station, Ronald repeated his story to his father, who questioned him at some length. Ronald insisted to his father and to the police officers that he was telling the truth, and his father agreed that a statement should be written down. One of the police officers wrote the usual caution on the top of the statement form, and its meaning was explained to Ronald by the officer and his father. The whole statement was taken down in the presence of Mr. Avard, senior, and a question put to Ronald by his father was recorded in the statement. The completed statement was signed by Ronald Avard and then by his father and finally by the two police officers present.
One further point of the pre-trial investigation remains to be mentioned. After Ronald Avard had been arrested and photographed the boy witness was again shown photographs, this time including one of Ronald Avard. He was given no indication whatsoever that the photographs were in any way different from the ones he had seen on a previous occasion, and he was not told at that stage that anyone had been arrested. The boy did not make a positive identification of Ronald Avard but he did remove his photograph from the others and say that it was similar to the man he had seen with the girl. It is impossible, of course, to say what went on in the mind of this young boy at the time,

and one cannot attach very much significance to this. It is possible that he picked out his photograph because it was of the one person he knew, but he did not at that time say—as one might perhaps have expected, "I know this man—it is Ron Avard, and he is not the man you want".
Ronald Avard appeared at Rugby Magistrates' Court in June, 1965. His statement was put in evidence as well as the statements of the two girls who had been assaulted. In accordance with the procedure allowed under Section 27 of the Children and Young Persons Act, 1963, the two children were not required, on the decision of the defending solicitor, to give evidence in person before the examining justices. Under the statutory provisions the defending solicitor could have insisted that they should attend to be examined and cross-examined in person, but he did not do so, and this I think is understandable. The solicitor has told the police that he had no reason at that time to think that there were any grounds for challenging the prosecution evidence. At the conclusion of the committal proceedings the justices found a prima facie case to answer and Ronald Avard was committed for trial.
When the case came for hearing at the Birmingham Assizes on 2nd July, 1965, the court had medical reports showing that Ronald Avard was suffering from severe subnormality, and, in accordance with the procedure set out in the Criminal Procedure (Insanity) Act, 1964, a jury was empanelled to try the preliminary issue of his fitness to plead. Not surprisingly, the jury found him to be suffering from mental disability to such a degree as to be unfit to be tried, and the court then made the only order which was open to it under Section 5 of the 1964 Act, that is, it ordered that Mr. Avard be admitted to such hospital as might be specified by the Secretary of State.
The action open to the Home Secretary was equally circumscribed. In accordance with the statutory provisions he is required to specify a hospital to which the person concerned must be removed within two months, where he is detained as if the court had made a hospital order under Section 60 of the Mental Health Act, 1959, together with an order under Section 65 of that Act.
My hon. Friend the Member for Rugby asked why Rampton was chosen in the circumstances, and why Mr. Avard was detained without limitation of time. In view of the nature of the offences involved, it was thought advisable that Mr. Avard should be detained in the security of a special hospital, and a warrant was issued for his admission to Rampton. One must look at the state of the case as it was in 1965, and the knowledge which the then Secretary of State had then.
All such cases are kept under regular review after admission to hospital. This is where I take issue with my hon. Friend, who said that there was a danger that Mr. Avard might have been left there for the rest of his life. In view of Mr. Avard's severe subnormality and the severe nature of the offences he was believed to have committed, it was considered that he would need treatment and training in hospital for some time.
I come now to the events which led to the reconsideration of the facts of the case, and I readily acknowledge that it was the active concern of my hon. Friend which brought further crucial facts to light. He will recollect the conversation he had with me in the Division Lobby last May, when he intimated to me his intention to write to me on the matter. I advised him to take direct statements from the witnesses concerned, so that we would better be able to judge the exact representations made by them.
In June last year, some three years after the events I have described, my hon. Friend sent me statements he had obtained from the older girl who had been the victim of the second indecent assault, from the boy who was with her, and from their parents. These showed that the two children knew Ronald Avard and were quite sure that he was not the man who had accosted them, and they alleged that they had told their parents so at the time of the trial.
There was no doubt of the importance of this new evidence, but careful consideration of the facts as then known left a number of puzzling questions which could not then be satisfactorily answered. Although it was said that the police had been told at the time that the children knew it was not Ronald Avard, there was no confirmation of this in police records; and it was difficult to understand how Mr. Avard's innocence could have been

known to the families concerned without its being effectively brought to notice before the trial or during the three years after it.

Mr. William Price: It is hardly likely that the police would have included in their records a reference to the fact that they had been told something but chose to ignore it.

Mr. Morgan: That depends on the view a person takes of the integrity of the police. My hon. Friend has said that he does not impugn their integrity. He cannot at the same time say that they would deliberately ignore such material information as that.
It was difficult, moreover, to reconcile this evidence with Ronald Avard's admission, made in the course of a careful and tactful interrogation by police officers and written down in the presence of his father, that he had committed the two offences. This admission was especially convincing in that he gave quite a detailed and accurate account of what had happened to the two girls. Inquiry of the defending solicitor showed that no information had reached him either before or after the trial suggesting that there was any doubt about Ronald Avard's own admission of the offences. The new evidence did not in any case go directly to his responsibility for the more serious offence on the younger girl.
The House will, I am sure, recognise that before intervening to set aside a court order, even in a case of this kind, my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary must be fully satisfied that there are good grounds for so doing. Because of the doubt and uncertainties which remained, it was by no means apparent that Mr. Avard had been wrongly accused, and on the information then available it was impossible for me to be satisfied that my right hon. Friend would be justified in intervening. I came, as I submit, to the only conclusion that was possible in those circumstances. My hon. Friend has already made it clear that his representations did not specifically refer to the more serious of the two offences, which amounted to attempted rape.
I wrote to my hon. Friend explaining the position, and I subsequently went over the facts with him when he came to see me in September. I told him then that any suggestion that Mr. Avard, senior,


had not been present—and that seemed to be one of the main planks in the platform at the time—when the statement was taken from his son, or that the police had ignored statements by witnesses that Ronald Avard was not concerned, amounted to serious allegations against the police which, if pressed, would call for investigation by the chief officer of police under Section 49 of the Police Act, 1964. My hon. Friend has very generously told the House how I explained the content of Section 49, and spelt out in detail the three subsections therein.
It was left that my hon. Friend would write to me again making a formal complaint against the police, and that I would then refer it to the Chief Constable for appropriate action. As it was, my hon. Friend did not write to me for about 10 weeks thereafter. That being so, I can only think that in so far as my hon. Friend has been reported in the Press as saying that he left the Home Office not knowing where to turn, he must have been misrepresented, in that he had been told by us very clearly what avenues were open to him at law in that connection.

Mr. William Price: This is an important point. What happened was simple. I took my holiday, and departed from the country for four weeks. When I returned, I went on two subsequent occasions to the witnesses in the case to make absolutely certain, without fear of contradiction, that they were prepared to stand by what they said. These were serious allegations; they were not made lightly.

Mr. Morgan: I am not in any way making a charge of delay against my hon. Friend. What I say is that there would be no substance at all in any allegation that the Home Office had not spelt out all the available courses which could be taken at that juncture.
In due course my hon. Friend did write to me again, and his complaint was—as I had told him it would be—referred to the Chief Constable of Warwickshire who is responsible in law for the investigation of complaints against members of his force. The Chief Constable arranged for the complaint to be investigated by a senior officer from another force, Detective Chief Superintendent Saunders, of the Leicester and Rutland Constabulary. I

join in my hon. Friend's very handsome and proper tribute to this officer.
After considering his very fair and lucid report, I want to make it quite clear that there is no ground for believing that the Warwickshire Police acted in any way improperly. I am satisfied that they investigated the case with tact and with due consideration for a mentally retarded person, and that there can be no criticism whatsoever on procedural grounds.
In particular, I must stress that the investigating officer's report did not support the two serious allegations that had been made against members of the force. Superintendent Saunders was satisfied that Ronald Avard's statement was properly taken in the presence of his father and in the manner described by the officers in their evidence. As I have already indicated, I accept that finding. Secondly, the investigating officer found no evidence to confirm that police officers had been told before the committal proceedings that two of the children knew that Ronald Avard was not the man involved.
Despite this finding, however, the investigating officer concluded that Mr. Avard was not responsible for the indecent assault on the older girl, and that no reliance could be placed on his admission of this offence, or of the earlier and more serious offence. I accepted that conclusion, and my right hon. Friend the Home Secretary, as was open to him, agreed to demonstrate Mr. Avard's innocence.
From the detailed account I have given it will be apparent to the House that these charges were originally made, and remained unchallenged for so long, because of a quite extraordinary combination of circumstances: the resemblance to the description originally given by the children; the convincing confession which persuaded not only the interrogating officers but also his own solicitor and, I venture to think, for a time at least his own father, and finally the failure, for whatever reason, to bring effectively to notice the fact that the two older children knew Ronald Avard, and knew that he was not concerned in the second offence he had admitted.
In this situation we must be cautious about any general inferences we may draw from it. My hon. Friend has referred to the effect in this case of Section


27 of the Children and Young Persons Act, 1963, and I am sure that he is right in thinking that if the children had been present to give evidence in the committal proceedings the case might have taken a different course. But that Section refers only to committal proceedings, and not to the far more important trial of the case itself. The point is that even if the Children and Young Persons Act, 1963, were different, and even if the 1964 Act were different and it had been possible in this case for Mr. Avard to plead, since it was the view of those advising him that there was no doubt whatsoever about his guilt, he still would have gone to Rampton in the same way. So it cannot be said that any material difference in the law would substantially have changed the circumstances of this case.
We then move on to the next stage, at the assizes, where we come face to face with the dilemma that Mr. Avard could not be tried in the ordinary way because he was not fit to stand trial. This is not an uncommon situation, and the law provides for it in the only way which has been found practicable which is by requiring that the accused person shall be detained in hospital for treatment as a patient in the same way as if he had been found not guilty by reason of insanity. This has been the general effect of the law since 1800, and although it has been considered by several distinguished committees three times within the last 42 years, no fundamental change has been found possible.
As the House will realise, it involves an acute conflict between the normal requirements of justice and the interests of safety. On the one hand, we must be reluctant to make any breach in the principle that an accused person must be presumed innocent until found guilty: on the other hand, we must have regard to the need to protect the public from the possible danger presented by a mentally disordered person who has, prima facie, committed an offence which may be serious—and I would remind the House that many such cases involve offences even more serious than those involved in the present case.
The statutory procedure was considered in 1923 by the Committee on Insanity and Crime, of which Lord Atkin, then Lord Justice Atkin, was the distinguished Chairman. It was again considered in

1953 in relation to murder cases by the Royal Commission on Capital Punishment. More recently, it was thoroughly investigated in 1963 by the Criminal Law Revision Committee. That Committee again found that there could be no satisfactory resolution of the central dilemma of how to try the issues of fact when the accused is not able to understand the proceedings. For a statement of the problems arising from the mental incapacity of a defendant, hon. Members cannot do better than to refer to paragraphs 13 to 37 of the Law Revision Committee's Report, where the whole matter is argued in detail.
After examining a number of alternative methods of securing some form of modified trial of the evidence, the Committee recommended, albeit by a majority, that the law should be amended to allow the court discretion to postpone consideration of the issue of fitness to plead until after the prosecution case had been presented, thus enabling the strength of the prosecution evidence to be tested if the defence felt that it was in a position to dispute it.
The Committee also recommended that there should be a right of appeal against the finding of unfitness to plead. Both of these recommendations were implemented in the Criminal Procedure (Insanity) Act, which Parliament accepted as recently as 1964 as the best solution of an intractable problem.
As my hon. Friend knows from my Written Answer to his Question of llth March, there are at present 446 persons subject to detention in hospital as a result of being found unfit to plead when they were brought to trial. Many of them, because of their mental condition, have been detained for many years. Of course, all concerned for justice must have a distaste for detention without trial and we would all prefer that these patients should have been properly tried and convicted, if that had been possible.
On the other hand, the House should consider the question that if, as the Criminal Law Revision Committee remarked in 1963, we resorted to what it described as the "absurd and cruel practice" of allowing a person unfit to plead to stand trial—and this links with the question of suggestability raised by my hon. Friend—there would again be the danger of convicting the innocent.
The Royal Commission on Capital Punishment, which was considering the most grave cases, commented that it had
… found no evidence to suggest that innocent persons, who would have been acquitted by a jury, are in practice likely to be found insane on arraignment; the facts are usually clear and beyond dispute".
However, the Commission thought that the cases of indefinite detention as a patient without trial ought to be kept to a minimum.
It is proper to note also that these persons are not being detained under penal conditions, but in a hospital where they are receiving the treatment and training they need, subject only to such restrictions as are necessary for the protection of the public from any danger arising from the patient's mental disorder.
In dealing with these patients, my right hon. Friend has constantly in mind that the offences charged have never been properly proved in a court, and the facts of the case are always closely examined if there is any suggestion that a person may have been wrongly accused. In practice, as I have said, there is not often much doubt or dispute, and I believe that Mr. Avard's unhappy experience was an isolated one.
Nobody can be entirely happy with a system which can give rise to even one case such as this. It is right, therefore, that we should look carefully at the law. Although so much expert attention is already being given to this matter, I would not presume to be optimistic about our being able to find a workable alternative procedure. However, we shall certainly look again for any means that will secure better safeguards for the accused person while, at the same time, seeking to provide due protection for the public.

SURREY FLOODS

3.53 p.m.

Sir William Robson Brown: I am glad of this opportunity to raise the question of the serious floods in my constituency.
I wish at the outset to express the indignation that is felt by my constituents because the Government have not instituted a public inquiry without delay into the flooding which occurred in my part of the world. The Government have

blandly hidden behind statements about this catastrophe being an act of God. Certainly there was heavy rainfall, but it is clear that great acts of irresponsibility have come to light.
The Government have blandly defended the actions and responsibilities of the Thames Conservancy, although that organisation has been singularly incompetent and Victorian in its attitude. Ten thousand of my constituents have signed a petition to the Government calling for a public inquiry to be held, but that request has been rejected. Even at this stage I demand that one be held.
Since the floods which occurred last September we have had 13 warnings of possible flooding being imminent. On at least two of those occasions extreme flooding would have occurred had there been a little more rain. This is a serious state of affairs and cannot be ignored. Action must be taken.
The morale of my constituents is broken. One statement says:
The further immeasurable damage is that to the morale of the people concerned who have to live in extreme difficulty and unpleasant conditions for six to nine months after the onset of flooding because it is impossible to carry out proper redecoration of property that has been damaged for this sort of period without incurring very grave risks of damage to new decorations by inherent dampness within the fabric of the building.
Many of the homes in my area have remained soaked throughout the winter.
I was shocked when the Joint Parliamentary Secretary came to attend a big meeting in my constituency, and I will explain why. But first, Mr. Mackie—[HON. MEMBERS: "Order."]—Mr. Mackie should be aware that good intentions are not enough. I have pressed you in letters, personally and in correspondence to conduct a public inquiry. Time and again my request has been turned down.
The Thames Conservancy has made many statements but do you know that although there was talk of raising 4d. in the £, not more than 55 per cent. of that amendment was raised—

Mr. Speaker: Order. The hon. Gentleman must not ask Mr. Speaker if he knows anything. He knows nothing.

Sir W. Robson Brown: I apologise, Mr. Speaker, for addressing the Minister by name. Now you do know, Mr. Speaker.
Recently I have tabled a series of Questions and the Answers to them have produced some telling facts. Some of these facts are shocking to learn. For example, there was a promise that within three months there would be a full investigation into the cause of the floods and that full arrangements would be made for the prevention of such flooding in future. We now find that only words have been used and that action is not to take place. An investigation is bound to take six months to carry out and it seems that, at the end of that period, there will be no sign of an effective remedy being found.
My constituents are frightened and indignant, and I do not blame them, particularly since no evidence can be seen of engineering work being done by the Thames Conservancy, which has power under the relevant legislation to call for money and to urge the Government to support work of this kind. Not one step has been taken to this end and my constituents have every right to feel annoyed and frustrated. They feel that nobody cares and that nobody wishes to take action. There are no defined authorities. There is no sign of any action. The division of responsibilities stands just as clear as it did before. I hope that my hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Mr. David Howell) will deal with this aspect in a broader sense. We in our district and in the whole of the Upper Thames Valley believe that there should be some new development and that a new authority should be set up.
I was shocked to learn recently that there is no arrangement for taking the water off the new Esher by-pass. This is an enormous by-pass going right through my district. This is an extraordinary situation. Since pressures have been brought to bear by myself and others, those responsible are beginning to examine the situation. This should have been done at the beginning. So far as I can see, nothing can take place this summer and I greatly doubt whether much will be able to take place until next year.
I want to pay one tribute to those in my district. Volunteers came out in hundreds—the police, the ambulance service, soldiers. Everybody rallied round and did their best. However, the Government

should have taken action. I ask the Joint Parliamentary Secretary to heed my remarks and to take quick and sharp action to ensure that this matter is dealt with in the way that we require and expect.

3.0 p.m.

Mr. David Howell: My hon. Friend the Member for Esher (Sir W. Robson Brown) is to be congratulated on the zeal and energy with which he has brought forward this matter for public debate. I hope, as I believe that he does, that this debate will not merely be an occasion for recrimination and blame for last September's disasters. No one would deny that the combination of events which led to those two hectic days of disastrous flooding were quite exceptional. It is worth recording that even before the 16 hours of continuous rain in which the average rainfall was never less than four inches the catchment area of the Wey, and I believe of the Mole as well, was well above saturation.
When that is said, however, the fact remains that it is not good enough to shake one's head and to say that these disasters occur every 60 years, so there it is, or to make global assessments about the moving of the Arctic icecap, and so on. Serious questions were raised by those disastrous two days about the safeguarding of the river towns of Surrey and about the safeguarding and development of Guildford.
The fact faces the people of Surrey, and my constituents in Guildford, that already since Christmas there have been four amber light warnings of flood danger. The people have a right to know that a systematic programme of response and action to the events shown by those disasters is in hand, that there is a clear plan of action aimed at identifying what the problems are, where they can be ameliorated, if they can, how, at what cost, and how we should set about these matters.
This debate will do nothing but good if it at least enables the Minister to say what the programme is and to set it out more comprehensively than has been done hitherto, indicating the relative responsibilities of the different tiers of authority. It is sometimes forgotten in the labyrinth of administration at Ministerial, county and local level, as the memoranda pass


to and fro, that in the end it is the ordinary person whose house or factory is by the river who wants to know what is happening, sees nothing happening and, therefore, worries and is concerned. It would be a great help if the Minister could help to set out clearly exactly what is being done, how it fits into the programme of intentions, and where the responsibilities lie.
I want to raise one or two specific points. First, on the question of flood warnings it should be recorded that the agency in question—the Thames Conservancy—acted promtly after the September disaster in setting up a flood warning system and that that system now works well.
There is, secondly, the question of remedial measures. By these I mean things that people can see being done in the way of dredging and bank improvements now, in the short term. It is true that local authorities, certainly those in my area, are already doing valuable work but inevitably it has to be on an extremely limited scale. It comes out of the rates and is a heavy burden on an already burdened account. Even with these short-term measures we already begin to see problems of divided responsibilities arising. It would help, again, if the Minister would clarify who particularly is responsible for this kind of remedial measure that local authorities are at present trying to undertake, particularly in urban areas.
In the long-term programme the public and hon. Members have one fact before them. We know that the Thames Conservancy announced promptly that it is undertaking a feasibility study. I suggest that it is not good enough if, when the Minister replies, he merely tells us that we must wait until that study is completed. I see the logic of that, but we are not only dealing with logic; we are dealing with people's worries. It is not unreasonable to ask the Minister to explain how this study is proceeding and on what basis. I understand that it will deal not merely with the general problem of Thames Valley flooding, but with schemes for specific areas. For instance, there will be a Guildford scheme recommended.
Can the Minister confirm that this study will set out its recommendations on the

basis of localities with precise plans and proposals and costed so that we the public, we the Government or we hon. Members are able to face up to the costs of doing what people would like to do, how much we can afford, and how much it is sensible to invest in future against a recurrence? I hope that the Minister will be able to set our minds at rest with more specific details than have yet been generally obtainable about how this scheme is being conducted, what are its aims, how its recommendations will be set out, and when we can expect it.
From the long-term programme, I turn to the broader question: who is responsible for what in flood protection and prevention? There can be no doubt that the September floods in Surrey raised important questions about where responsibilities lay. In urban areas there is considerable doubt about responsibilities between the various agencies of the central Government and local authorities for control of sluices and weirs—not on the Thames where responsibility is clear, but on the Wey, the Mole, and other rivers.
I emphasise my request and plea that the Minister should tell us who is responsible for the overall programme of flood protection and prevention in Surrey. We cannot afford the kind of shadowy confusion which so often seems to arise. I do not know whether it is a fact of government these days, but it arises all too often in Ministrys' relations with nationalised industries. Hon. Members have the greatest difficulty in establishing who is the responsible head of the agency concerned, what his functions are, what the functions of the Minister are, and how they relate. We cannot afford that confusion of responsibilities in a situation where serious threats to lives and property are involved.
I cannot resist commenting that it seems strange that, as so often in these matters—again this may be a fact of life with the kind of Government organisation that we have in this country today—it apparently needs a disaster to force people to ask themselves who is in charge, whether these matters need reviewing, and where the responsibilities lie.
I believe that much the best thing the Minister could do would be to describe with some precision his plans for the kind of structure of authority at Ministerial, county and agency level for future


flood control and reassure us that these matters will not only be reviewed every time there is a disaster—perhaps every six years, or more often—but that they will be under constant systematic and periodic review so that the best application of resources can be made and people can be reassured that they are not the helpless victims of events against which no preparation has been made. I know that efforts have been made over the years, and are being made, to deal with this problem, but we have to ask whether these efforts are enough, or whether some steam needs to be put into this programme. I hope that the Minister will give us his ideas about this.

4.10 p.m.

Mr. Cranley Onslow: I congratulate my hon. Friend the Member for Esher (Sir W. Robson Brown) on his persistence in following up this matter and in obtaining a chance for us to debate briefly the events of last September. In my constituency 1,200 houses suffered serious damage. I know that the number of houses damaged in my hon. Friend's constituency was considerably higher, but my constituency was the second greatest sufferer, and many houses still bear traces of the floods. What is more, many householders are still facing the cost, either in material damage to their property and furniture, or in the fact that their houses are less saleable than they were before this event.
It is fair to say that to a large extent the floods were unforeseeable. They came at an extremely difficult time, on a Sunday when the local councils were scarcely geared to cope with them. The pattern of the floods was such that with the side streams breaking their banks first flooding often took place in the middle of the night and the water subsided by morning, whereas the main flood waters were lower downstream. The whole situation was extremely difficult, but it brought out the best in almost everybody whom I met in the street. It was a glorious day, and a great deal of paddling was going on. The people were extremely good humoured, but their good humour has not extended to this time when they are much more concerned with knowing what preventive action is being taken, and what steps are being taken to see that if there are further floods the

authorities are better able to cope with them.
The flood warning system is welcome. It was introduced by the Thames Conservancy three months to the day after the floods and it has been very worthwhile. How worth-while I can illustrate from my own experience. When I saw the waters of the Wey flowing into Byfleet I asked the police to try to find out how high the water was likely to rise. They sent a message to headquarters but were unable to find anyone who could say whether the water was rising or falling. It is good to know that we are now to have a warning system, but we need more. We need to know whether there is a system of river control. This is not simply a matter of getting water away faster so that it floods people lower down stream rather than flooding ones own area, but of trying to control a river which is unusually and dangerously full of water, so that it does less damage.
I hope that the Minister has seen the report which was submitted to the Surrey County Council at its meeting on 21st January, 1969. I have no intention of quoting from it at length, but it highlights the need to establish a definite chain of command and responsibility. There are two recommendations in the report of the General Purposes Committee which I should like particularly to draw to the Minister's attention so that he can comment on them. It says:
… attention should be drawn to the need to supplement the resources normally available to deal with local disasters, such as flooding, so that fire cover standards are not unduly affected, and … the difficulties might be partly mitigated by the location of some emergency appliances and equipment … at exiting fire stations and by the availability of trained local volunteer personnel.
I know that during the floods very limited use was made of volunteers, for reasons about which I am still not wholly clear. There were ex-A.F.S. personnel in parts of Surrey who were anxious to help, but their services were not accepted. This was unfortunate, but perhaps the effect has not been so unfortunate, because the volunteers were so angered by the refusal to accept their help that they are now doubly determined to keep in existence as a cadre against the time when we may once again have a proper civil defence organisation, and against the time when we are able to reverse the attitude shown


by a letter I received from the Home Office—from the hon. Member for Dover (Mr. Ennals)—which attempted to explain the Government's attitude, referring to the need to keep volunteers in regular training and provide them with proper facilities, as follows:
The provision of these facilities costs money and if this were to be provided, it would frustrate those econmies which the Government decided earlier this year had to be achieved.
I could think of many areas where economies were much more necesary, and where they would be much more effective, than in the relief of distress and disaster.
The second point, arising out of the passage which I have quoted, concerns the availability of appliances. I believe that the ex-A.F.S. pumps were withdrawn and concentrated at the Home Office stores at Redhill. When the floods came up this policy was proved conclusively to be the worst of all possible policies, because practically all the road communications throughout the county were cut and the central reserve of pumps was thus inaccessible, as I think was the experience in the West Country floods earlier this year. We see the need to prepare locally against the contingency that communications will be disrupted, and to see that appliances are available on the spot. This the Government must accept.
Can the Minister tell us what he is doing? First of all, can he tell us what he is doing here anyway? I would have been much more encouraged to find the Minister of Housing and Local Government represented on the Front Bench. I would have expected that. This problem should devolve upon that Ministry rather than the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food. I am fortified in this argument by the exchange that I had with the Minister of Housing and Local Government in this House on 12th November last, when I asked him a Question about the publication of the findings of his inquiry into the September floods, and he said:
I shall be sending a Circular to local authorities which will be available to the House and to the Press about any points of concern to them that emerge."—[OFFICIAL REPORT, 12th November, 1968; Vol. 773, 189–90.]
I understood that the Ministry of Housing and Local Government would do

that. I should have thought that the Minister accepted overall responsibility for this aspect of the matter and that he might have been represented here by someone from his own Ministry to tell us what happened to that circular—because to the best of my knowledge, it has not yet issued from the interstices of his Ministry.
Also, I should like to be told—again from the Minister of Housing and Local Government—what reactions have been sent to the Surrey County Council in respect of the report from which I have quoted, because that report was sent not to the Ministry of Agriculture but to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government. I am not aware of the publication of any official response. One may have been sent but I hope that if it has not the hon. Member who represents the Ministry of Agriculture can enlighten us about it.
There is evidence of muddle, confusion and disruption of the chain of command not merely at local level but at Ministerial level in coping with events of this kind. It does not seem possible to persuade the Government to stand up and identify this matter as the responsibility of one Ministry. If this is allowed to continue it will lead to a much worse situation.
It may be that we shall not get floods like this for another 20 years, and that all who are in this House now will long since have taken themselves to other places by then, but if we do not learn the lessons of these floods now, and apply them now, such opportunities as we have to profit from the sad experience of others will have been lost. So far there has been insufficient evidence that the Government are determined to draw conclusions and learn lessons from the events of last September, even though I hope that the Minister will now be able to prove that I am wrong.

4.20 p.m.

Sir George Sinclair: I should like to join in the tribute to my hon. Friend the Member for Esher (Sir W. Robson Brown) on his success in securing this debate. My constituency was heavily affected by the flooding of the River Mole and its tributary streams and slightly affected by the flooding of the Wey.
One of the salient facts of these great floods of last September, which I did not


witness since I was outside the country at the time, is that, at any rate on the Mole, they were four times as severe as the highest recorded level. The Thames Conservancy, especially, from 1965 onwards, carried out works on the Mole designed to cope with floods equivalent to the highest in their records. But we must now look forward to a period in which the run-off will be greater because of development of all kinds, especially in areas around Gatwick Airport and the expanding towns of Crawley and Horley.
Although I do not believe that, in this case, the built-up areas could have greatly affected the final dimensions of the flood, because the whole of the valley systems of the Mole and the Wey were completely saturated before the heavy rains which actually brought the floods. Nevertheless, it will clearly be hazardous from now on, to rely on flood prevention works which will cope only with the highest floods known up to 1965. We should, I suggest, prepare for something at least between that and the floods of last September.
I was particularly glad to hear the emphasis which my hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Mr. David Howell) laid on the need to define the national and regional machinery for dealing with this problem.
There is a real gap in the chain of responsibility between the Thames Conservancy, which has authority for the main stream and some of the main tributaries, which are clearly defined, and the various district councils, which are responsible for the streams which lead into those tributaries. There is very little evidence of close collaboration between the Thames Conservancy and the district councils in planning for flood control.
In view of what has happened, what proposals has the Minister for ensuring that the Thames Conservancy, the main water authority in the area, keeps under continuous review, with the district councils, the problems which they essentially share. Although the Thames Conservancy has done important works on the Mole in recent years, I wonder how far it has taken into consideration the build ing and other developments in the catchment areas which have led to quicker run-off and whether—this might be wisdom after the event—the Conservancy

and the councils have been too hesitant in claiming a share of the rates to allow them to carry out the works which were required to keep these streams in the best possible order.
May we have an assurance that the combined powers of the Thames Conservancy and the districts authorities are sufficient to enable them to cope with the privately owned mills, weirs and sluices on the side streams? In the areas coming within the authority of the Thames Conservancy this responsibility clearly falls on the Conservancy, but in respect of the anciliary streams there is not, I suggest, adequate control over these additional sources of danger.
My hon. Friends and I are more interested in the future than in the past, but we hope that the last period of flooding—which brought a great deal of suffering and extensive and expensive losses—will be used as a stimulus to obtain a proper chain of command for the control of floods within the Thames Valley system. I hope that the Minister will clearly define that chain of responsibility, from the Minister to the Thames Conservancy, to the County Council and on to the various district authorities. It is important that the public should know this, and this chain should enable the authorities to take swift action when disaster threatens.
I hope that the Thames Conservancy will give full publicity to the results of the investigations which they are now making into the question of flood control. I hope that their reports will be published without delay because the people in my constituency and in the whole of Surrey will shortly be facing another winter and the risk of further flooding. They want to see these reports published soon and any action that can be taken, taken soon.

4.27 p.m.

Mr. Maurice Macmillan: I apologise for not being present at the start of the debate, which occurred somewhat earlier than I had anticipated.
I have little to add to what my hon. Friends have said, although I should perhaps declare my interest in that my firm suffered some pecuniary loss from damage to books which were stored in the constituency of my hon. Friend the Member for Esher (Sir W. Robson Brown), who


I thank and congratulate for having raised this subject today.
I join hon. Members in congratulating the authorities which, on the whole, did their best in extremely difficult circumstances during the floods. I, too, prefer to think more of the future, which I hope will include a bigger rôle for voluntary organisations. They were used to some extent in assisting with flood relief and so on, but not to the fullest possible extent partly because they were shut off from the equipment that they wanted to use.
My hon. Friend the Member for Guildford (Mr. David Howell) asked for a programme to be announced in that it is important that the Minister should carefully delineate the responsibilities up and down the river of the various authorities, for if this is not done we may find our constituents being put to a lot of trouble and having to do a lot of work which may be either unnecessary or inadequate in scope according to the areas in which they live, either up or down stream. This could lead to an unfair distribution between the various ratepayers concerned of the cost of local work done by different local authorities.
I hope that the Minister will comment on a legal anomaly which has been brought to my attention. It is the situation of a riparian owner on a corner or bend of the stream or river; the bank on his property is breached by sluice gates being opened higher up stream and water coming through the breach destroying the gardens of his down stream neighbours. I understand that the riparian owner whose bank is breached is legally responsible for the damage done to his neighbours' property, rather than the authority which ordered the sluice gates to be opened. This seems to be a somewhat peculiar situation and, whether it could be remedied restrospectively or not, any consideration for the future should include definitions for dealing with this kind of situation.
We all wonder whether with the existing limits the powers and methods of operation of the Thames Conservancy are as efficient as possible. I do not blame the Board, but wonder whether its establishment and terms of reference are completely adequate for conditions which have changed considerably since

the Thames Conservancy was established. Perhaps we should think more of a Thames Valley authority with wide power, both direct and consultative, over developments which may affect the Thames Valley and its concomitant tributaries, but which might be undertaken by authorities some way away and in areas which, by their nature, could never be flooded.
For example, the Parliamentary Secretary will be aware that a considerable urban development is about to take place in the Swindon area and it will have a considerable effect on the volume of water and the speed at which it goes into the Thames. Happily, I understand that this has been appreciated and that steps are being taken to hold back water in areas where it can do no damage and to dribble it into the river rather than to allow it to enter in enormous masses. I wonder whether the arrangements and co-ordination for ensuring that this sort of consideration is taken into account in big new developments are adequate
The House would like to know to what extent, when it comes to dealing with actual flood water, it is possible to divert overburdened streams or rivers so as to ensure that if flooding must take place, it occurs in relatively innocuous areas, that is to say, in open fields, rather than in houses. I understand that arrangements of this sort have been made for the Sussex Ouse.
Finally, we should all like the Minister to deal with this problem under three separate headings—the actual coping by the authorities whose responsibility it is to deal with the results of flooding, the guarding of houses when floods come, minor works and so on; secondly, with the coping with the exceptional volumes of water to prevent flooding and flood damage; thirdly, the ultimate prevention, trying to ensure that abnormal volumes of water do not get into rivers, particullarly when those abnormal volumes are due, partially at least, not so much to nature as to mankind's alterations of nature, including the much more efficient drainage of fields and so on, which tend to make existing volumes of water move more and more quickly into the rivers as the years go by.
If the Parliamentary Secretary can deal with those three major issues as well as with the other questions which have been


raised, we shall be able to do what is our duty as well as our wish—reassure our constituents who are apprehensive and worried about next winter.

4.33 p.m.

The Joint Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food (Mr. John Mackie): I am sure that hon. Members will wish first and foremost to join with me in again expressing our sympathy with those who suffered loss and damage in last year's floods. There is nothing worse than having one's home flooded, particularly at the beginning of what was to be a very wet winter. The discomfort must be appalling. As the hon. Member for Esher (Sir W. Robson Brown) knows, I visited many of the houses which were flooded and one cannot have too much sympathy for the people concerned.
The hon. Member for Esher and I, on a number of occasions over the past six months, have discussed this whole question, but I am nevertheless perfectly prepared to discuss it again today, and I am grateful to him for giving me the opportunity to do so.
I should like first to deal with the causes of the floods last September. There cannot be any doubt that these were due almost entirely to the phenomenal rainfall on 15th September. In parts of the Thames Conservancy catchment area nearly 6 in. fell in two days, much of it in 18 hours, and it fell on land much of which was already saturated by prolonged wet weather. The massive run-off which this caused was greater than many of the river channels could carry. The River Mole had been improved between 1955 and 1964 by major works at a cost of £375,000 so that it could carry the greatest flow of which there were records at that time, but the flow on 16th September, was four times that record and it was quite impossible for the river to cope with it.
The hon. Member for Esher asked about expenditure on flood prevention. The Conservancy have the right to precept up to 4d. It is an autonomous body and it is for the Conservancy to judge how much to precept. The hon. Member for Farnham (Mr. Maurice Macmillan) spoke about an unfair burden on the rates in various areas. We appreciate this and it is being looked at with a

view to spreading the rate fund in a better way.
The hon. Member for Woking (Mr. Onslow) referred to the reports by Surrey County Council going to the Ministry of Housing and Local Government. The hon. Member was not pleased to see me here to reply to this debate. I am sorry about that, but I am afraid that he must put up with me. There are various questions about departmental responsibilities concerning rivers. The Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries and Food is and always has been responsible for land drainage and flood prevention protection work. The Minister of Housing and Local Government acted as a co-ordinating Minister dealing with the consequences of flooding and these involve the interests of many Departments including that Ministry.
I do not know whether hon. Members are asking for a Minister of Flooding. They must realise that various Ministries have different responsibilities. Various matters come under the term "flooding" and individual Departments can deal with them without needing to be co-ordinated. Action in an emergency situation is carried out by local councils under the Ministry of Housing and Local Government and my Ministry has the job of protection against flooding.
The hon. Member for Woking admitted that there is much hindsight in considering what should have been done. He talked about the central administration and collection of pumps. If we were to have a sufficient number of pumps in particular places when there was flooding all over Britain I do not know how many pumps we would need. It seems better to have the pumps in some place where they can be rushed to a place where they are needed. The hon. Member spoke about communications breaking down and the pumps not being got to a place in time, but this was a local feature of this particular flood.

Mr. Onslow: I am not asking for the purchase of millions of pumps to be dotted about the countryside, but if a river is in flood there is every advantage in having half the pumps on one side and half on the other.

Mr. Mackie: That is not what the hon. Member said in his speech, but I take the point. The hon. Member for


Esher and a number of his constituents have suggested that the flooding could have been at least substantially reduced if the River channels had been better maintained and the sluice gates more effectively controlled. They have been pressing for a public inquiry. I agree that the experience of last September hightlighted the need for the efficient operation of all sluices and to keep them clear of debris. I have no doubt that one could point here and there to bits of the stream which could have been better cleared. I am advised, however, that with a flow so much greater than the channel capacity, and with obstructions to flow forming at bridges and other places, any deficiency in the operation of sluices such as we know occurred at Zenith Weir could have had no significant effect on the degree of flooding.

Sir W. Robson Brown: My point was that at the meeting at Esher which the Parliamentary Secretary attended the spokesman for the Thames Conservancy gave the impression that he had a precept of only a certain sum. The spokesman did not tell us that he was spending only 55 per cent. of it. The people of Surrey want to know why he did not do the whole job.

Mr. Mackie: I answered that point earlier by saying that the Thames Conservancy had to decide how much was required. I am making the point that with the amount of rain and flood that there was then any additional action the Board had taken would have made little or no difference—maybe an inch or two inches. It would have had no significant effect on the degree of flooding.
Similarly, maintenance could not have been all that important a factor. The Conservancy Board has spent substantial sums on maintenance of the rivers over the years. Even if some specific rivers were not as well maintained as they should have been, this could not have made any significant difference to the degree of flooding with flows of the magnitude which occurred last September.
The hon. Gentleman also tackled me on the question whether there was consultation about the new Esher by-pass. This is always done. There is always considerable consultation when anything is being done that is likely to create a bigger run-off of water.
The hon. Member for Dorking (Sir G. Sinclair) mentioned the question of development and the consultations which must take place if there is building in the flood plains. Some mention was made—not today—of Gatwick and Crawley. I know that the Conservancy was consulted about the effects of this and other developments and took measures to cope with increased run-off—for example, the construction of detention basins for the run-off from Gatwick. But these measures were not designed to cope with run-off of such wholly exceptional magnitude as occurred last September.
The Conservancy Board has full powers under the byelaws to control mills, sluices and weirs. The Chairman of the Thames Conservancy, Lord Nugent, has said that the Conservancy will look into the whole question of taking over many of the main weirs so that the Conservancy has fuller control than it has at present.

Sir G. Sinclair: On a point of clarification, will the Joint Parliamentary Secretary confirm that the Thames Conservancy's powers over sluices, weirs and mills are confined to those tributaries of the Thames where its authority lies and not to the side streams, many of which are many miles long and contain weirs, sluices and mills?

Mr. Mackie: I confirm that that is the case. The Board has full control only over its own. The councils have control over others to a certain extent.
The hon. Member for Guildford (Mr. David Howell) raised the question of flood warnings and criticised the absence of any flood warning system at the time in question. The Conservancy, like other river authorities, has no statutory duty to provide a flood warning service; but for many years river authorities have in fact operated flood warning systems for their most important rivers. The Thames Conservancy operated one for the Thames itself, but not for its tributaries such as the Mole and the Wey. The experience of last year suggests that a more comprehensive system is necessary, and hon. Members have been stressing this point. At a public meeting which I chaired last November at the invitation of the hon. Member for Esher, Lord Nugent promised to institute a flood warning system for the Rivers Mole and


Wey. This promise has now been fulfilled and the system on these tributaries, and on the River Loddon, have in fact been used to alert the police on a number of occasions this winter, although fortunately it has not, I believe, been necessary to issue any general warning to the public since the September floods.
Hon. Members have raised the question of a study and examination of the feasibility and cost of undertaking further works on the lower Mole and Wey to protect Molesey, Esher, Walton, Weybridge and Guildford against flooding. A study of these complex problems cannot be completed overnight. The hon. Member for Esher said that at the meeting it had been promised that this study would be carried out within three months. My recollection is that it was promised to be done in four months. Lord Nugent has now said that the report of the study should be ready before the end of June, and I hope it will.
The hon. Member for Guildford wanted me to be more precise about this. It is asking too much of me to say with precision what a technical body will do. We have asked it to go into the whole question and to estimate what it will cost. They have been asked exactly what it would cost to prevent flooding which occurred on the scale of last September. This is a very big job indeed. The hon. Member for Farnham (Mr. Maurice Macmillan) asked what studies have been made to deal with flood flows arising from development in the country. Flood studies are being undertaken under the National Environment Research Council at a cost of about £250,000 and they should produce greater information on the volume and frequency of flood flows and should help in the design of flood protection schemes. But to be precise on this very difficult problem is not possible.
I have been asked to say what has been done in the meantime. Anybody who has been in the countryside this winter knows that one difficulty has been to get any sort of heavy drainage equipment on to the land at all, for it has been floundering about all over the place and doing more damage than good. Nevertheless quite a lot has been done, and the Conservancy is getting on with the job of maintenance. I am sure it would have boosted people's morale it they

could have seen the work in progress, but it has not been assisted by the fantastic winter that we have had.
The hon. Member for Esher argued eloquently, as he has in the past, in favour of a public inquiry. I appreciate that when things go wrong, so much often depends upon an accurate diagnosis of the trouble, but I cannot see that any public inquiry is needed to tell us that rain of an exceptional magnitude fell over the Thames catchment area. I know that this is not a very good argument, but in fact it fell at a frequency which is experienced once in about every 150 or 200 years. No inquiry could alter the fact that the river cannot carry four times the flow for which it is designed—I agree that "designed" is a curious word to use in this context—without overspilling and causing serious havoc.
We therefore considered that the right course was not to spend money and valuable technical time on an inquisition into factors which could have little if any effect on the degree of flooding, but instead to encourage the Thames Conservancy to concentrate on constructive measures which its Chairman has promised to take and has already put in hand. I can assure the House that this work has not been confined to Surrey or the Thames Conservancy. There have been floods in Yorkshire, Essex and the West Country—indeed, all over the place. It has been suggested that there was no co-operation between the local councils, but I can assure the House that there has been considerable co-operation. Other river authorities—they are autonomous bodies—have also been reviewing their problems of drainage, flood prevention works and the order of priorities in the light of last year's floods. But in many cases it will not be feasible for either technical or economic reasons to give physical protection against flooding from the sort of rainfall we had last September. It is important, therefore, to ensure that in these areas arrangements are made wherever possible to give effective flood warning.
As the House knows, my Department convened a meeting of representatives of river authorities and other interested organisations to consider how the existing flood warning arrangements can be improved in the light of experience last year. This conference recommended that


every river authority should carry out a comprehensive review of the flood warning system and determine, in consultation with local authorities and the police, what extensions were desirable and feasible in the coverage of its flood warning arrangements to meet the needs of vulnerable communities and industries throughout its area.
In the light of that recommendation, a number of river authorities are considering proposals for substantial extensions of their river monitoring systems in order to be better equipped to give warning of impending floods in future. I greatly welcome this, and urge other river authorities to follow their example.
The Government place great importance also on liaison between river authorities and planning authorities to ensure that flood risks are not increased unnecessarily by development in flood plains or by failure to take full account of the implications for drainage and flood prevention of proposed building, highway and other developments. I discussed that aspect of the matter earlier.
I think that hon. Members here present will know that one inch of rainfall produces 100 tons of water per acre. There are 50,000 acres or thereabouts taken every year for development, for roads airfields, housing—covered with concrete, tarmac, tiles or in some other way—so that about 5 million more tons of water each year have to be disposed of. This extra water must be got rid of, not in two or three days as it seeps through

agricultural soil or in an hour or two but literally in minutes. This is the problem, as the hon. Member for Farnham pointed out. When there are 6 inches of rainfall in the time which I mentioned, a few moments' calculation can show the extent of the problem.
My right hon. Friend and I are shortly to convene a conference of planning and drainage authorities to consider whether there is scope for improvement in the present arrangements. I appreciate the point which hon. Members have made, that there seem to be rather too many different Departments concerned, but this is in the nature of the beast with all the different facets of the question, land drainage, planning, local authority work and everything else, it would be very difficult to have one Department dealing with it all. I am sure that hon. Members understand that.
In all the ways which I have mentioned, both the Government and the river authorities are studying the lessons learned from the unfortunate events of last year. That is what hon. Members have pressed upon us. I ask the House to accept, remembering the fantastic size of the job which we have to do, that we are applying the results of those lessons as constructively and rapidly as possible.

Question put and agreed to.

Adjourned accordingly at six minutes to Five o'clock, till Monday, 14th April, pursuant to the Resolution of the House 25th March.